Banana

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Mick F
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Banana

Post by Mick F »

Just had a banana.
Not much into fruit generally, but banana I do like.

Eating one always reminds me of years ago when I was cycle-commuting. 17miles in, full day's work with a lunch in the middle, then 17miles home again. I would be starving hungry getting home and could have eaten the furniture! :lol:

Mrs Mick F would thrust a banana into my hand and say, "Here! Have a banana, tea will be about half an hour!"
Banana eaten, and it took the sting out of my hunger.

Also, a good memory of the movie 42nd Street. The girls are singing in the sleeper car and one is eating a banana!
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Mick F. Cornwall
softlips
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Re: Banana

Post by softlips »

Which end do you open them at?

Most people in the UK open them at the stalk end. Countries where bananas are a major part of the diet open them like monkeys and apes - at the bottom. It’s easier, obviously the animals know what they’re doing.

Speaking of countries where they are part of the staple diet reminds me of my nurse training. We were told to discourage the consumption of more than two bananas per day and told six or seven could kill an adult due to the potassium they contain. Then I found out in some countries people will eat and average of 35 per day and to get the levels of potassium patients are often prescribed would need over 400 bananas.
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Mick F
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Re: Banana

Post by Mick F »

End?
Yesterday, the one I had, refused to open at either end, and it split open in the middle! :lol:
Today's opened up easily and cleanly at the stalk end.

Animals open them by biting them. Maybe they bite the easiest end to bite.
Mick F. Cornwall
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Audax67
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Re: Banana

Post by Audax67 »

One of my favourite cycling staples is the banana & chocolate-chip sandwich. I make them small and wrap them individually so that they can be eaten on the bike.
Have we got time for another cuppa?
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al_yrpal
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Re: Banana

Post by al_yrpal »

We both have a banana every morning. What drives me bananas is the supermarket trick of packing 5 bananas instead of 6, why do they do it? Love soft fruit, strawberries, blackberries, blueberries and raspberries and if we have a pudding with our main meal its invariably fruit.

If you keep the green bit on bananas stalks covered and free of air they last longer. As they ripen bananas emit phosgene gas. In Costa Rican pineapple plantations they use ripening bananas to spark small pineapple plants into producing baby pineapples.

Al
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Bonefishblues
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Re: Banana

Post by Bonefishblues »

I open by splitting.
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661-Pete
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Re: Banana

Post by 661-Pete »

al_yrpal wrote:As they ripen bananas emit phosgene gas.
Phosgene? Are you sure you've got the right gas? Bananas emit ethylene gas in small quantities - and this happens to help ripen other fruit nearby (a good tip for ripening avocados).

Phosgene, on the other hand, would probably kill you.
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Bonefishblues
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Re: Banana

Post by Bonefishblues »

661-Pete wrote:
al_yrpal wrote:As they ripen bananas emit phosgene gas.
Phosgene? Are you sure you've got the right gas? Bananas emit ethylene gas in small quantities - and this happens to help ripen other fruit nearby (a good tip for ripening avocados).

Phosgene, on the other hand, would probably kill you.

You don't use a gas mask around your bananas? :shock:
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661-Pete
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Re: Banana

Post by 661-Pete »

Bonefishblues wrote:
661-Pete wrote:
al_yrpal wrote:As they ripen bananas emit phosgene gas.
Phosgene? Are you sure you've got the right gas? Bananas emit ethylene gas in small quantities - and this happens to help ripen other fruit nearby (a good tip for ripening avocados).

Phosgene, on the other hand, would probably kill you.

You don't use a gas mask around your bananas? :shock:

I'd be better off wearing a Hannibal-Lecter-type muzzle - to stop me eating too many.... :oops:
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rualexander
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Re: Banana

Post by rualexander »

Make the most of them, the bananas we know and love may be headed for extinction.
The Cavendish variety, which is the standard version we eat in this country and other western nations may be wiped out by disease in the coming decade or so, due to their lack of genetic variation. They are all essentially clones.
Norman H
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Re: Banana

Post by Norman H »

661-Pete wrote:
al_yrpal wrote:As they ripen bananas emit phosgene gas.
Phosgene? Are you sure you've got the right gas? Bananas emit ethylene gas in small quantities - and this happens to help ripen other fruit nearby (a good tip for ripening avocados).

Phosgene, on the other hand, would probably kill you.


An easy mistake to make. Saddam Hussein wishes he hadn't stockpiled all those bananas now :) .
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661-Pete
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Re: Banana

Post by 661-Pete »

rualexander wrote:Make the most of them, the bananas we know and love may be headed for extinction.
The Cavendish variety, which is the standard version we eat in this country and other western nations may be wiped out by disease in the coming decade or so, due to their lack of genetic variation. They are all essentially clones.

We shall just have to get used to other varieties then. It's a shame that virtually all bananas sold in UK are of the threatened Cavendish variety.

Having read a bit of background, I note that up until the 1950s, a variety called Gros Michel was the dominant one sold in the West. But it succumbed to disease and was replaced by the Cavendish. Since then, it seems a disease-resistant strain of Gros Michel has been developed so perhaps it could make a comeback. Apparently its flavour is slightly different than the Cavendish, but I'm not old enough to remember.

Banana plants are quite easy to grow in much of Europe - including warmer and more sheltered spots in the British Isles. It's getting them to fruit in temperate climates that is the difficulty. But with global warming - who knows?
Suppose that this room is a lift. The support breaks and down we go with ever-increasing velocity.
Let us pass the time by performing physical experiments...
--- Arthur Eddington (creator of the Eddington Number).
Cyril Haearn
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Re: Banana

Post by Cyril Haearn »

al_yrpal wrote:We both have a banana every morning. What drives me bananas is the supermarket trick of packing 5 bananas instead of 6, why do they do it?
..
..

Why six? I know chickens can count, eggs are laid in batches of six :wink:

One earnestly hopes the bananas are not wrapped in plastic, if there is one food that does not need packaging..
Last edited by Cyril Haearn on 19 Aug 2018, 6:17pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Cyril Haearn
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Re: Banana

Post by Cyril Haearn »

There is a Banana Museum in Sierksdorf Germany near the Baltic
Not sure if bananas grow there
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Mick F
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Re: Banana

Post by Mick F »

West Indian bananas versus African bananas.
Two different varieties.

Been there, done it. :D
Mick F. Cornwall
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