10 Fun Facts About Bananas
1. Americans eat on average about 27 pounds of bananas every year.
2. If you peel a banana from the bottom up, holding the stem, you will avoid the stringy parts that cling to the inside.
3. Wrapping the banana stem with cling wrap will make them last days longer.
4. Hawaii is the only state in the U.S. that grow bananas commercially.
5. The highest banana consumption per capita is Ecuador. Residents eat about 218 pounds per year. {WOWZA!}
6. Bananas are technically berries.
7. The banana split was invented in 1904 at a pharmacy soda fountain in Latrobe, Pennsylvania. {Hey! That’s where Mr. Rogers was born.}
8. About half of people allergic to bananas are also allergic to latex.
9. A cluster of bananas is called a hand. A single banana is called a finger. {That totally makes sense.}
10. More than 95% of American households purchase bananas at least once a month.
So there you have it, 10 fun facts about bananas!
Had you heard any of those fun facts before? Do you have any of your own to add? Is there a particular produce item you’re just dying to know more about? I take requests!
Also, I’m curious… Do you prefer your bananas loaded with spots on the skins like I do {Because HELLO, they’re sweeter!} or are you freaked out by the spots and will only eat the completely yellow ones {the HH!}. 🙂
~Mavis
Looking for something delicious to make with your spotted bananas? Check out my recipe for Banana Nutella Muffins. The Girl and I are CRAZY for them! 🙂
Robin in WI says
Best banana split I ever had was at the Playa Los Arcos hotel restaurant in Puerto Vallarta. So delicious and fresh I ordered one every day I was there. 🙂
We rarely buy bananas — so fun to eat one then watch your torso inflate from the gas. When we do get a bunch, I slice them up and fry them with butter or coconut oil and cinnamon.
Laura Ziegler says
I like mine a little spotty. Here’s an easy delicious treat. Peel and freeze 3-4 spotty bananas that have been cut into chunks. Toss them in a blender with some 1-2 TBS baker’s cocoa and a few tablespoons of the milk of your choice (I like almond) and blend until completely incorporated. Viola! Chocolate banana soft serve. I sometimes add vanilla or coconut extract to taste. If you want a milkshake, add more milk!
Cindy R says
I actually be got to visit the Le Lamentin Banana Farm in Martinique on a cruise we took. It turned out to be one of the most interesting places I have ever visited and I enjoyed learning about how bananas are grown, harvested, and packed for shipping way more than I could have ever imagined. For instance bananas are not grown on trees, they are actually grown on what is a stalk from a species of the largest grass in the world.
Mel says
Interesting! I wonder what qualifies as commercial growing. Our CSA included red bananas and mini bananas from an organic farm in Florida this past winter. Or maybe Hawaii is the only part of the U.S. that grows the yellow Cavendish type commercially.
Fifitr says
I’m weird, I like my bananas green and slightly hard- brown spot ones are too sweet for me. But I do save them to make muffins and bread with.
Did you know the vast majority of bananas, and pretty much all the ones farmed commercially, are a single variety, the Cavendish I believe. Short sighted of us when something comes along and attacks that variety…
Ulvmor says
I might be a bit allergic to bananas, because ripe bananas makes my mouth itch. Greenish bananas are ok, and they taste better… But I can eat brown/spotted banans in banana bread etc.
Katie says
I like them at least yellow. I’m definitely the one in the house who eats them with spots. My kids like them green to green/yellow. Gag. I cannot handle the texture on my teeth at that stage.
Tiffany F says
100% the same here in my home!
Diana says
We live in the San Diego area and grow our own bananas. We have over 100 plants! They taste so much better than store bought, creamier texture and sweet!
Did you know bananas are not a tree? They are actually considered an herb!
Jamie says
We hardly ate bananas until our family went to Vietnam. They just tasted different there and we fell in love. When we came home we tried again to find bananas we love. They are the only fruit that we can tell if they are organic or not, and only eat organic. We go through 3 lbs. a week per person at my house now!
Yellow for eating. Spotty ones are made into banana bread, frozen for smoothies, or pan fried with sugar and eaten with ice cream to make a Thai dessert.
Margo says
Another fun fact… Iceland is the largest grower of bananas in Europe. They are able to grow them in greenhouses heated by geothermal energy!
Nikki says
I am sure the Canary Islands are the biggest growers in Europe
Being part of Spain
Katie says
Oooh, I love bananas deeply spotted and then peeled and frozen for smoothies. I buy about 20 lbs of bananas a week and have them on rotation for getting spotted so that I CAN freeze them, haha!
Fun banana fact: if you want your bananas to ripen more quickly, pull off the cling wrap (usually on organic bananas) and separate the bananas, so you don’t have a “hand” but just the “fingers.” Mine ripen much more quickly this way.
Thanks for the fun posts as always, Mavis!
Jennifer Bouknight says
Yellow only and dh likes some green. I have always heard because they were high in potassium, they were good for leg and other muscle cramps.
After dh had open heart surgery, they offered him a choice of a potassium pill or the promise that he would eat a banana a day for the first 14 days after he was released. He chose the banana.
Linda Practical Parsimony says
I eat at least three pounds of bananas a week and have shopped for them three days a week, searching for the best ones. Usually, one trip a week is all I need to find bananas I will eat, even leaving green ones to ripen on the counter. I absolutely cannot stand a banana with any green at all. The smell gags me. Yes, I can smell green.
Black skins don’t mean a thing to me. I have peeled a black banana and found the inside still white and firm and delicious.
However, I cannot stand to eat bruises. they get cut out immediately. If a banana goes too soft, I just use a fork to mash it up and put it into a glass of milk for some chunky banana milk.
Probably, I eat more than three pounds per week.
Rosemary Calhoun says
A friend told me that if you separate all the bananas from the cluster, they will ripen more slowly. If they all stay attached, they ripen quicker. When I buy bananas I always separate them and they do last all week. I eat a banana every morning (good source of potassium) and also use them in my fruit smoothies. As a child, I would only eat the ones with spots (they are sweeter) and I still prefer the sweet ones.
Pamela J Sheppard says
My personal fun/not so fun fact is while I like bananas I avoid them. I get terrible indigestion when I eat them. I remember saying I didn’t like bananas as a kid. I guess because I couldn’t explain why I didn’t want to eat them!
Laura says
I prefer green to yellow, although I will eat with some spots if I have to, but would rather not, much to sweet.
Mary L Buzzell says
One daughter likes them spotty, other kids and spouse like them yellow and I like them with some green. My window for eating them is short.
Katherine says
I like green on my bananas and my husband likes spots so it works out well at our house.
Sue says
Get a mosquito bite, rub it with the banana peel. Takes away the itch for me.
MEM says
#8 is for real! My 25 year old daughter is highly allergic to latex and bananas. And kiwi. They are all related somehow. BTW the older I get, the less I like bananas. They just don’t taste good – texture and flavor-wise. I need to try one of the “San Diego” bananas, above.
Pam says
As long as it’s not too mushy I will eat it no matter what the skin looks like and, if it does get too mushy, it gets thrown in the freezer for banana bread/muffins.
Surovec, Samantha says
I read recently that the flavor of artificial banana is based on the last banana type we used to eat (again, only one type was produced commercially and a disease wiped them out) and now the current type, Cavendish I believe, is suffering the same fate with a different disease and they are trying to bring back the previous type. Wonder why growers don’t diversify?
Nikki says
Gros-Michel, Lacatán, Poyo, Gran Enana y Pequeña Enana. Are all commercially grown in the canary islands
They must have English names but I don’t know them
Canarian bananas are generally smaller and more curved
They are mostly sold in Spain but also in the rest of Europe
Jaime A. says
I love bananas! But they have to bee green just about to turn yellow. I can’t handle the texture, otherwise. I save the spotty ones for my smoothies. 🙂
e says
this was a new discovery for me with bananas….. vegan banana peel pulled pork!?!?! but apparently some of the South Americans are ahead of us with this… in Brazil they call it carne louca which translates to ‘crazy meat’ ! if you do a search for banana peel pulled pork or something along those lines, you’ll see some neat recipes.
Rae Sutherland says
Toss your banana peels around the base of your rose bushes, they love them and will grow beautiful flowers, no need to cut them up in pieces or bury them.