V8 V-Fusion Vegetable & Fruit Juice

Trying to get the USDA recommended 5 servings of fruits and (especially) vegetables into my children every single day of the week is a Herculean feat, in fact, it’s more like a poorly paid full-time job. While my son is pretty easy going, enjoying a wide variety of fruits and vegetables, my daughter, on the other hand, poses me with the greatest challenge. In fact, there are so many fruits and vegetables she’s rejected over time that my son took it upon himself to create a list of these “offensive” foods she will not eat and has placed this list on our refrigerator for my quick and easy reference.

Given my daughter’s fickle nature, I am constantly bringing home new fruits and vegetables in a variety of forms. These attempts to find something she’ll willingly eat in turn give me the peace of mind that she is getting at least close to the daily requirements. Most recently, I spotted a bottle of V8 V-Fusion when I was shopping the juice aisle of my grocery store. It caught my eye because it was 100% juice that offered one full serving of fruits and one full serving of VEGETABLES per 8 oz serving. If you take a closer look at the ingredients, you’ll discover that this juice is not only made of the usually fruit juice suspects – white grape, apple, and orange, but is also includes a few surprises like sweet potatoes, carrots, beets, and tomatoes. In addition, depending on the flavor you chose (they have several) V8 throws in a few more juicy combinations – we tried Strawberry Banana and yes, real strawberry and banana purees were added. V8 Fusion is antioxidant-rich with vitamins A, C and E and there is no added sugar or artificial ingredients.

Now to the best part – my daughter (and son) love the flavor of this juice. It can best be described as a not too sweet tasting strawberry banana smoothie. My children love the flavor so much I ran out and bought a few more bottles while they were still on sale. A true testament to my daughter’s enjoyment of this juice came the day my 9 year old son, while enjoying a glass of this juice, was reading the nutritional info on the bottle (he is my son, after all) and he announced in a completely surprised and booming voice that “hey, there are sweet potatoes and beets in this juice.” I held my breath in anticipation of my daughter, who was also drinking the juice, pushing the glass away from her in ultimate rejection -- when it never came I knew she really did like this juice. Phew!