Cherryfest Is Friday at Whole Foods Markets in Boca Raton and Coral Springs

D H Wright via Creative Commons

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Whole Foods Market of Boca Raton, 1400 Glades Road -- See if your love of cherry pie measures up during the cherry-pie eating contest from 1:30 to 2 p.m. Sign up at the produce department by 1:20 p.m. if you want to enter. The winner gets a pound of cherries -- in case you aren't quite literally sick of them at that point -- and a $25 gift certificate.

For an equally graceless but presumably less gluttonous competition, try the pit-spitting tournament from 1 to 1:30 p.m. Entrants will see who has the lung capacity -- or would it be core strength? -- to shoot a cherry pit the farthest distance. Sign up on the patio.

Organic cherries will be on sale all day, and there will be demos on how to make cherry almond smoothies from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m.

Whole Foods Market of Coral Springs, 810 University Drive -- Free tastings and demos of two cherry creations -- cherry salsa and cherry smoothies -- from noon to 5 p.m. during the store's Cherry Fest Jubilee.

There is no cherry-pie eating contest at this store, but if you're feeling competitive, you can guess the number of cherries in a vase to be eligible to win a pound of said fruit (presumably, not the same cherries that have been smashed into the vase). There are also cherry sangria coolers available for $4.99 at the Allegro Coffee Bar.