Bananas
See, you've got your small red bananas. And your big, need-to-be-cooked plantain. And the supermarket Cavendish banana.Cow has been reading a couple books* about Bananas.
Encouraged by the surprising facts garnered by this pastime, Cow tried the red bananas, and even fried a plantain.
Results: You must be really, really certain the red bananas are ripe. Otherwise it really isn't possible to spit it out fast enough. When ripe though they taste about the same as the Cavendish.
Plantains: if you want a fried banana, it's pretty good.
Why, you ask, is Cow trying these new bananas? There is a banana fungus poised to obliberate the Cavendish, and nobody can stop it. It caused the loss of the Gros Michel in the 1920's (first big banana blight) and now there's another surge of ambitious fungi. So flexibility in banana consumption will be essential.
Kind of like when the polar bears are extinct from global warming, we'll just have to use other kind of bears. Right?
Moo!
*Bananas!: How The United Fruit Company Shaped the World by Peter Chapman; and
Banana: The Fate of the Fruit That Changed the World by Dan Koeppel
posted by The Topiary Cow at
1:58 PM
15 Comments:
Plantain chips are pretty good, too. Fairtrade do a nice line, slightly sweet and spicy. Best still: unlike potato chips they count towards your "five fruit and vegetables per day" total.
Bananas are the fruit of the gods, although humans have a habit of wasting the tasty skin.
What?!? Oh no! We love the supermarket Cavendish variety. It's "quite possibly the world's most perfect food," right?
...
But if all the bees die we'll be losing a lot more.
[sigh]
Topiary, I had the same spitting out reaction on a very over ripe apple recently.... properly ripe fruit is definitely a must.
KM: Plantain chips, eh? (not seen these on this side of the Atlantic)
GB: Banana skin...banana skin...banana skin (perhaps only gorillas can love this)
Sandi: Yes, Cow is hoping the bees make it somehow too. Disaster seems to be staring us in the face, and relying on scientists to always find a solution may not work.
WC: An apple a day kept the watercolorist away?
Moo!
I love regular bananas.
You know that picture of Napoleon with his hand in his shirt? Legend has it he was holding a banana.
Or not.
Doghouse - LOL!
Oh, I so must step up my fruit eating game. My children are better at it than me. Does banana pudding count?
Cow is seriously grieved that despite much Napoleonic reading, she is shown up by Doghouse's deep knowledge.
The truth is out there. Or, maybe it's just a banana.
And yes of course, nana pudding counts.
Moo!
Slapping a very ripe banana into the dough mix gives a really tasty home-made bread. It even works with savoury elements like cheese and thyme (I'm not convinced rosemary's a good partner, though). Necessary warning: if you're doing it in a bread machine plan on making a small loaf: yeast + very ripe banana = boisterously expanding dough!
Cow is gaining insight into the depths of Kevin's culinary knowledge.
Banana Nut Bread is very tasty!
Great - now I'm craving banana nut bread!
Kevin, now I'm craving cheese/banana/thyme. Mmmm..
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