Bananas are handy to have in the kitchen as a quick breakfast or tasty snack, but most people do not realise they are storing them in the wrong place. If your bananas are going brown and mushy after just a few days then it is probably because you are storing them in a fruit bowl, which is one of the worst areas to keep them.
It may sound bizarre, but bananas are highly sensitive to ethylene gas, a natural plant hormone most fruit produces once they have been harvested to help them ripen and become much more flavourful. If too much fruit is piled in a fruit bowl, excess ethylene in the air can cause bananas to ripen and spoil faster.
Mandy Applegate, a cook and founder of Two City Vegans, says you can keep bananas fresh and yellow for much longer if you store them in the fridge instead.
She said: “Placing bananas in the refrigerator extends their shelf life once they’ve reached the desired level of ripeness. The cold temperature slows down the production of ethylene gas.
“Although the skin may darken, the fruit inside remains firm and unchanged.”
Many people believe that bananas cannot be stored in the fridge as it can change the colour of the banana peel, but the fruit inside will stay the same and still be tasty to eat.
Keeping bananas stored in the fridge keeps them away from other fruit and the cold temperature with halt the ripening process.
However, make sure to only keep yellow bananas in the fridge that have fully ripened as it will stop green unripened bananas from developing completely and the fruit inside will be bitter.
If you want to store green bananas then it is best to keep them by themselves somewhere in the kitchen at room temperature and away from other fruit.
The best way to keep bananas stored at room temperature is with clingfilm, which may seem strange but blocking the stem helps stop the release of ethylene gas.
Many explained: “Wrapping the stems of bananas in plastic wrap effectively slows down the room-temperature ripening process. The stems release the ethylene gas, so covering them traps the gas.”
This simple food storage technique will extend a bunch of banana’s shelf life for up to a week, and once they are going ripe you can put them in the fridge to help make them last even longer.