You can actually make your bananas last more days — in fact for another one week if you store them in some particular ways. This is not just a an article that will tell you to store your banana in the refrigerator to make it last longer. If that is what you thought you would see here, you are wrong because these are just some tricks that I learnt about, tried them out and found to work.
Making Banana Last More Days By Delaying Ripening
First, let us quickly run through what makes bananas (and in fact all our fruits) ripen in two paragraphs. When fruits are mature, they are harvested or plucked from the trees and kept where they can now get ripen for consumption. Fruits that are not mature before harvesting will just stay that way and not become ripe — no matter what you do to it.
When bananas get detached from their parent or damaged in some way, it commences ethylene production and ripening starts. Ethylene causes the banana cells to make all the changes involved with ripening — Chlorophyll (the green color pigment) is broken down, causing color changes; starches are converted into sugars, making the fruit sweet; acids are broken down, causing it to taste less sour; and pectin is broken down, making it softer.
So, how do you delay this ripening? Prevent all the agents of ripening from getting to your banana. How can you achieve this?
Buy Greener Bananas
Since banana ripen at a very fast rate — unless you want to eat your banana in a couple of days, get those bananas that are greener toward the stems (where the fingers join together) and more yellow on the fingers (not too yellow though).
When you get them, make sure they have no bruises on them as this will accelerate ethylene production and lead to quick ripening of your banana. So, even when they don’t have bruises when you buy them, ensure you handle with care such that they don’t get bruised as you take them home in your shopping container.
DO NOT Refrigerate The Bananas
As against what many would be expecting, do no refrigerate the banana that you have bought in the state recommended in Tip number one. Why? When you put the banana in the cold temperature of the refrigerator, it causes the cell walls of the banana to break down prematurely.
This breakdown allows the production of melanin (the pigment that gives us the color of our skin), turning bananas completely black. However, the inside flesh of the banana will still remain unripe because the cold would have prevented ethylene production, and hence ripening.
Let these bananas ripen under room temperature, then store in the refrigerator.
Keep your bananas away from other fruits
It may surprise you that just like some diseases, ripening is also contagious. So, if you don’t want your banana to ripe too fast, keep it away from other fruits (and vegetables) that you have. They produce ethylene and that can trigger ripening your bananas too.
So, the best practice is to take your banana away from other fruits and keep at room temperature (without putting them in any bag). If they are already fully ripen and you want to prevent deterioration, you can keep in the refrigerator.
Cover the stem of the Banana with Nylon
This method can make your banana last for another five to seven days. When you get your unripe banana and you want to slow down ripening, get nylon and tie around the stem of the banana bunch to prevent passage of oxygen, hence delayed ripening.
Another way to do this is to separate the fingers, but care must be taken not to cause injuries to the banana fingers. After separating them, you can now tie nylon around their stem. This is way easier than thing them together as a bunch.
If you have any other method that you use to make your banana last longer, please share with us using the comment box.
