Finally, the world’s most popular fruit gets a day of its very own, and it’s about time! Whether you like it straight from the peel, sliced on cereal, or baked into a banana bread, the whole world loves banana! Who can blame them, considering how versatile it is? Banana Lovers’ Day celebrates those who just can’t get enough of this brightly colored monkey bait!
What you may not know is that the whole world is eating ONE kind of banana, and that banana type is not the same thing your great-great-grandparents were eating during WWI or WWII. Banana’s have been one of the biggest examples of monoculture in our history, and something in the past hundred years we had a massive plague hit, wiping out every banana of this strain in existence. So an entirely new banana was introduced and is now the one that is grown everywhere.
- Bananas float in water because they are less dense in comparison.
- Bananas are one of the most popular fruits in the American diet.
- Bananas grow on plants that are officially considered an herb.
- The banana is actually classified as a berry.
- Bananas may be considered a mood enhancer because it contains the amino acid, tryptophan and Vitamin B6 that helps the body produce serotonin.
- The bananas we eat today, the Cavendish, are different from pre-1960s’ bananas, the Gros Michael, as those have been wiped out by “the panama disease.”
- Bananas can help lower blood pressure and protect heart health due to high potassium and low salt content.
- India is the largest producer of bananas followed by China, Uganda and the Philippines.
- More than 100 billion bananas are eaten every year in the world, making them the fourth most popular agricultural product.
- Americans eat an average of 27 pounds of bananas per person every year.
- More than 96 percent of American households buy bananas at least once a month.
- 51 percent of bananas are eaten for breakfast at home
- The inside of a banana peel can help relieve itching and inflammation, such as from bug bit or poison ivy.
- Bananas are great pre-workout snacks because they are loaded with potassium that aids in maintaining nerve and muscle function during work outs.
- Humans share about 50% of our DNA with bananas.
- The scientific name for banana is musa sapientum, which means “fruit of the wise men.”
- The fastest marathon ever run by a competitor dressed as a fruit was 2 hours, 58 minutes, and 20 seconds—recorded at the Barcelona Marathon on March 6, 2011. The runner was Patrick Wightman from the United Kingdom, who dressed as a banana.
- The Banana Club Museum, located on Highway 111 in Mecca, Calif. (just south of Palm Springs), houses the world’s largest collection devoted to any one fruit. It contains more than 17,000 banana items, most of which have been donated by members. (To join the club, visit www.bananaclub.com.)
- To whiten teeth naturally, rub the inside of a banana peel on your teeth for about two minutes every night. If you gargle with salt water, this will heighten the effect. Expect results in about two weeks. It works because of the effect of the potassium, magnesium, and manganese in the banana peel.
- In 327 BC, when Alexander The Great and his army invaded India, he discovered banana crop in the Indian Valleys. After tasting this unusual fruit for the first time, he introduced this new discovery to the Western world.
- The word banana is thought to be of West African origin, possibly from the Wolof (language of Senegal, the Gambia and Mauritania) word banaana, and passed into English via Spanish or Portuguese.
- Banana bread first became a standard feature of American cookbooks with the popularization of baking soda and baking powder in the 1930s, appeared in Pillsbury’s 1933 Balanced Recipes cookbook, and later gained more acceptance with the release of the original Chiquita Banana’s Recipe Book in 1950.
- More songs have been written about bananas than about any other fruit.
- In 2016, Chinese live-streaming services have banned people filming themselves eating bananas in a “seductive” fashion.
- You can use the inside of a banana peel to clean and polish leather shoes and purses.
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