Hello. We like it when we have proper stuff to tell you about our drinks, so here's some proper stuff - new recipes and everything.

Making stuff a bit better

Mangoes and passion fruits is one of our most popular recipes. It was the fourth recipe we ever invented, after the Original Three. So it's been around for a while. People still seem to like it; some people seem to love it. But we thought we might be able to make it a bit better. So we have done. We added a bit more mango, added a squeeze of lime to lift the flavour and what do you know? It tastes better. Not 100% better. That would have been difficult, seeing as it was already great. But we reckon it might be about 27% better. Maybe 32%. You should try it and see what you think.

Our first peach

It's shameful we know, but we've never quite got round to making a recipe that uses peaches. Until now...

A new kids smoothie recipe was born this week - peaches & passion fruits. Eleanor, who's one of our recipe inventors, says it's "a sweet and refreshing peach recipe with subtle passion fruit tones". I guess she would say that, but the thing is that she's right. It's an absolute pearl of a recipe, and that's down to the fact that we took a while finding the best peach varieties (Catherine and Sudanell, in case you were wondering). Very tasty, and yellow fleshed to boot, which adds even more flavour. Lucky kids.

Some stuff about CO2

Jess is in charge of sustainability here at Fruit Towers. She went to a conference the other day and came back with some facts that made us think:

This is karate

Our Tarsila is off to fight in the karate world cup. More specifically, it's the Go Kan Ryu world cup, which is a specific style of karate. Go Kan Ryu roughly translates as "The Hard and Complete System of the Way of the Empty Hand", but we prefer to call it GKR, like the pros.

Tars has visualised what will happen in the final. "With the time down to the last 30 seconds with equal points, I will win the title with a sweep to the leg, bringing my opponent down and then striking the body so quickly that they won't even see it coming."

So if any other GKR fighters are reading, watch out. She's already visualised it, just like Desmond from Lost. It's going to happen. Be very afraid.

And finally...

Hello. We hope that the plants in your garden are well watered and that you are also removing the limescale from your kettle on a regular basis to ensure fresh tasting tea. This will ensure a harmonious life.

The Green Globe Award

We'd like to tell you about a special new award that we won. Now, as you know, not only do we like to buy the best tasting fruit, but we also try to buy it from farms which look after both the environment and their workers. To help us do that, we work with the Rainforest Alliance, an international non-profit organisation that protects ecosystems and the people and wildlife that live within them.

Last week it was the Rainforest Alliance's 20th birthday, and at the celebrations we were lucky enough to receive their Green Globe Award for businesses that "demonstrate an extraordinary commitment to furthering sustainability by integrating environmental and social sustainability into their work."

They only gave out three such prizes worldwide, so we were honoured to win. We promise to carry on being good and doing good, even if Rich and Adam did look like scruffy b*ggers when picking up the prize.

A new frontier

Exciting times in Nordic climes. This week we sold our first drink in Sweden, land of the midnight sun, pickled herring and the Happy Pig himself. To start off, our smoothies are available in airports in Stockholm, Gothenburg and Malmo. But there's more planned. In the mean time, here's a photo of our Niina waving a Swedish flag in Stockholm's Arlanda airport to keep you happy.

We're Great Britons

We also won another award this week, on the telly. It was for ‘Business Achievement’ at the Greatest Britons Awards 2007. Award winners included Amy Winehouse, Ricky Gervais, Dame Helen Mirren, David Beckham and the Queen. So we’re in pretty good company. You will be pleased to hear that we didn’t shame ourselves at the party afterwards. We were very measured and only occasionally stared at celebrities. And there was definitely no touching. Read our blow by blow account of the night here.

Magic breakfast

Magic Breakfast is a charity that was set up four years ago to supply free, healthy food to kids in schools. Currently one in four children in the UK turns up to school without eating anything in the morning, meaning that they're too hungry to learn. But Magic Breakfast are doing their bit. Last year they fed nutritious breakfasts to 250,000 school children, which is pretty impressive. Back in April, we had a load of spare drinks here at Fruit Towers, so we gave Magic Breakfast a call to ask if they'd like them. The next day, children in 17 primary schools across London had one of our breakfast thickies in their hands first thing in the morning. Since then, we've had a steady intake of thank you letters into Fruit Towers from the various schools, which has definitely put a smile on our faces.

Blackpool Pleasure Beach

As the Bank Holiday approaches, we'd like to take this opportunity to tell you that we are sampling some of our lovely drinks at Blackpool Pleasure Beach on Bank Holiday Monday. They have a new ride called Infusion, the world's first suspended looping coaster completely over water. We won't be having a go, mainly because we are scared. See you there.

And finally...

Hello. How's your week? That good? Excellent. We'll see if we can help you maintain that upward spiral, like going up a helter skelter backwards.

Oh goji

We told you about our new superfoods recipe last week, but we didn't fully explain goji berries. First of all, the reason they're called 'goji' is that it's an English contraction of the Mandarin name for wolfberry, and they're about as nutritionally rich as is possible, full of vitamins B1, B2, C, antioxidants, 18 amino acids and the richest source of beta carotene of all known foods. Yikes. They also helped a man called Li Qing Yuen live to the ripe old age of 252. He ate a lot of goji. When asked for the secret of his longevity, Li Qing Yuen said that one should "sit like a turtle, walk like a pigeon, and sleep like a dog".

Two new boxes o'fun

We would like to announce the arrival of two new recipes in our big one litre cartons. First of all, our 'natural vits A & C' superfoods recipe, which contains oranges, carrots and mangoes. >50% of your vitamin A RDA and >110% of your Vitamin C RDA in every glassful. For real.

And then there's our first ever seasonal smoothie in a big carton. A whole summery litre of cherries and strawberries for you to swig. We'll be changing it when autumn arrives, so make hay while the sun shines, if you've got any hay.

PS excellent cherry fact - they're rich in ellagitannin, which has anti-inflammatory properties, and salicylic acid, which is Mother Nature's very own painkiller.

Both these recipes will be available in Waitrose and Sainsbury's this week, then Asda in June and Tesco in July.

British Sandwich Week

When we first started selling our drinks, we mainly sold them via sandwich shops and cafes. So we are very proud to be the official sponsors of British Sandwich Week. You may be asking yourself what British Sandwich Week is, so we thought we'd explain. The deal is that between 13th-19th May, by law, you must eat at least one sandwich. The legal definition of a sandwich is AT LEAST two slices of bread, between which is placed a 'FILLING' which can be either cheese, ham or jam-based. Please note - the sandwich MUST contain at least one of these ingredients. And perhaps some pickle too. If you disobey, something bad could happen, like no more sandwiches, ever. A sobering thought.

The Iron Man

Spare a thought for our Fordy. This weekend, while you're sitting in your back garden eating pork pies and drinking shandy, Fordy will be doing this:

2.4 mile open water swim (3.8km) 112 mile bike ride (180km) 26 and a bit mile run (aka a marathon) (42km) ...in under 12 hours

It's the Lanzarote Iron Man, and yes, he did choose to do it himself. More here and more about the people he's running/swimming/riding for here.

The innocent village fete

We've been slightly cagey about this so far, but now is the time to sing from the rooftops - we're having a big fete this summer. There are more details here, and as members of the family, you'll be the first to hear about tickets and stuff, but for now, keep 4th-5th August free.

And finally...

No messing this week. All we're going to talk about are drinks. New drinks. So, to the drinks...

A brand new brand

Our juicy waters are no more - as of today they're going to be known as This Water, which is a new brand we've invented. It means that we can leave innocent to focus on fruit (and nothing but nothing but fruit), while This Water will be all about (you guessed it) water. To start off with, you'll find the original juicy water recipes in This Water bottles, but we've got big plans to make all sorts of interesting watery drinks. Have a look at the new site here and let us know what you think on the blog.

Super new

It's time to unveil our fourth superfoods recipe. This one is all about slow release energy, and we're pretty excited about it, seeing as we're using a whole load of ingredients that we've never tried before. Pink guava, which has the highest fibre content of any fruit that we use. Goji berries, containing vitamins B1, B2, C and the richest source of beta carotene of all known foods on Earth. And mangoes, because they taste nice. The result is stunning. A low GI, slow energy release smoothie, with bags of nutrients and lots of taste. What's not to like?

Slow release science

We'd just like to take a moment to tell you why exactly our new superfoods recipe releases energy sloooooowly. And of course, it's down to the ingredients. Pink guava has the most fibre of any fruit we could find, which means that the body breaks it down sloooowly, releasing energy into the blood stream steadily. Mangoes are full of fibre too, so when we put them together, we found we had the perfect slow-release energy smoothie. Should keep you awake this afternoon.

Next week we'll tell you all about the goji berries...

May's monthly recipe

To complete our hat-trick of newness, here's May's smoothie of the month. This one's got mangoes, coconut & lemongrass in it, and it's got a palm tree on the label. Lemongrass is rich in a substance known as citral, which is believed to aid digestion and relieve ailments such as headaches. So if you ate a big pie and washed it down with a quart of Chablis last night, this one's for you. Please enjoy.

And finally...

Hello and welcome to a birthday edition of the innocent news. We are eight, so to celebrate we've got some new stuff to show you, as well as that clip of the very important man playing the bongos. Read on...

A sneak peek at an advert

We've made another advert. This time it's for our kids smoothies, and features Freddie, who's eight years old (a bit like us). Freddie won a competition to find someone to star in the ad via this very newsletter, so we thought we'd show you the ad first.

We'd love to know what you think?

A word about fruit

We just thought we'd let you know that if you're lucky, you'll find some Alphonso mangoes in your local shops at the moment - it's the season. They're a bit smaller and less shiny/pretty than the usual supermarket varieties (e.g. Kent) but boy do they taste good. We only use Alphonso mangoes in our smoothies, so we're always happy to sing their praises. Ours come from a very specific area in coastal Maharashtra (India). The soil there is rich in iron, due to some volcanic activity a while ago, and it's the iron that helps give them their deep yellow/orange flesh and insanely intense flavour. Buy one today and taste it for yourself.

We are 8

On 28th April, innocent was eight. To be exact, it was eight years ago on this date that we sold our first smoothies in a shop called Out To Lunch, round the corner from our first office. It's not there anymore - Phil the owner upped sticks and moved to Watford. Anyway, we had a little party yesterday to celebrate (our birthday, not Phil moving to Watford). Jelly, triangle sandwiches, pass the parcel and a magician called Martin who wears a magic suit. It was excellent. Have a look at some pictures here.

As always on these occasions, we'd like to say thanks. Without you buying the drinks we'd be kind of stuck, so thank you. You are the finest drinkers in the land.

A big summer teaser

Some of you may have been to Fruitstock before. It's the big festival that we've put on over the last few years. Well, this year we're going to do something a little different. We want to get back to nature. Fewer rock'n'roll antics, more chucking stuff at coconuts and lying about in the grass. The first weekend in August (4th & 5th) is when it'll happen, in a park in London. More news as we get it, but for the moment, please keep that weekend free.

And finally...