Fruit and Health

Smoothies count towards your 5 daily fruit and veg Claims upheld by Advertising Standards Authority
It's not always easy to reach the daily recommended intake of 5 portions of fruit and veg every day.
So the idea of drinking a handily packaged fruit smoothie as part of our daily routine is an attractive one. This was the claim made by the Innocent smoothie brand in a TV advert which was challenged by some complaining viewers.
But now in a ruling by the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) - the official advertising watchdog - this claim has been upheld.
Innocent claimed that "each one of our cartons contains all this fruit, which means each glassful contains two whole portions. Two of your five a day".
This was made possible because the Department of Health had recently changed it's guidelines to allow smoothies containing all edible parts of a fruit, or 100% fruit juice, to count as two portions of fruit.
The ASA said: ''We understood that each 250ml serving contained all the edible parts of the pulped fruit, contained a sufficient amount of edible fruit and of fruit juice, and, additionally, did not include a dairy product. Because of that, we understood that a 250ml portion from Innocent's current smoothie range could provide two portions of a person's five a day.''
You can read the Department of Health's guidelines here.
In order for a smoothie to qualify, it must be purely made from fruit. Some smoothies contain other ingredients, such as dairy products or sugar. These would therefore not qualify.