I went shopping the other night at Kroger’s. Ostensibly, it was just for a few things: Bananas, Bagels, and Milk. The banana display stand was almost empty. Just a few scattered bunches, many spotted brown, and with three or four bananas in each bunch. They were picked over.
I once was at a training class (for OnBase, the document management solution, of all things) and sat next to a guy from Costa Rica who worked for Chiqita in Cincinnati, Ohio. He explained that Americans prefer buying nearly green bananas, and only like to eat them when they are a golden-yellow color, and unblemished to boot. We are picky and lousy customers. Europeans, being smarter(?) know that the brown spotted bananas are ripe and flavorful.
I happen to like the brown ones, a lot, but the rest of the family likes them ala American, golden-yellow. To serve them when they are that color, you pretty much have to buy them green yellow, and hope for the best.
An interesting thing happened, though, at that banana display. There was one other woman looking over the meager selection, and we began to compete for the bananas. She took a bunch with three green and one yellow, so I grabbed a bunch. She took another, so I did too. There were only a few bunches remaining—brown spotted, the way I like them—and she dared to take one of those. So I took two bunches of brown spotted. These bananas, by the way, were huge, like they were straight out of a South East Asian porno movie. Eventually she backed down, and left the display, but we had nearly picked it clean.
I think I broke my own record for most bananas, and I’ve been eating four huge ones a day ever since. If it’s possible to overdose on banana-supplied potassium, I’m on my way.