Yes! We Have Know Bananas

Did you ever feel that people don’t understand you?

Just be glad you’re not a banana.

Bananas are probably the most misunderstood fruits in the world.

Let’s begin:

Did you ever see a banana tree?

Couldn’t have.

It’s not a tree. It’s a pseudostem that looks like a tree. It might even be a perennial, but it’s not a tree.

In fact, if you’re familiar with the blessings that the Jewish people say over fruits, we traditionally bless, “the fruit of the tree”.

Not for bananas. We bless them as “the fruit of the ground” the way we do with vegetables. (Strange how our rabbis knew hundreds of years ago that bananas don’t grow on trees).

Thought that bananas only come in yellow? (Well first they’re green, then they’re yellow.  Then they’re brown, but we won’t talk about that part). Bet you didn’t know they also come in red and purple. You probably thought that only grapes and beets come in purple. Not so. How else would you make banana wine if not from the purple ones?

Unlike grapefruits and oranges, when you bite into a banana the juice doesn’t come squirting out. That’s because it’s a dry plant. Right?
Wrong.

Bananas are 75% water and only 25% dry matter. (Human beings are only about 67% water).

Bananas are usually quiet fruits. They lay on your kitchen counters and usually don’t call much attention to themselves. But shy, they are not!

In fact, they are the most glorious, shining stars of God’s little acres.

How’s that? Everyone knows that bananas are high in potassium. In fact, they are also high in radioactive potassium 40. That means that when the sun shines on them, they actually glow! Not only the banana itself, but its leaves too. But only when they’re ripe so that birds and animals that don’t “see” in sunlight, only in the ultraviolet range, know when it’s time for a tasty treat.

Aren’t you glad you got to “know” a little bit about bananas?

So whether you eat them, drink them, use them for cooking oil or chip them as a snack, understand, you can go bananas for bananas.