Banana: The Fate of the Fruit that Changed the World

Banana Splits of the World

DAIRY QUEEN: "Delicious DQ soft serve covered in luscious strawberry, pineapple, and chocolate toppings, with whipped topping and nestled between a sweet banana." DQ's advantage is that it is ubiquitous; her highness has outposts in nearly every U.S. state, and internationally, too (I ate at one in Beijing.)The ice cream is special - no other soft-serve tastes like DQ - and that makes the split nearly perfect. Price: $3.00. Rating: four of five. Royal hint: go for the banana split blizzard instead - all the ingredients, mixed into a cup. Locations: Almost 6,000.



CARVEL'S "BANANA BARGE": No official description. But the picture speaks for itself. The best quality soft-serve in the bunch, but just two scoops/swirls. Unconventional name, unconventional presentation, but it works. Price: $6.00. OW! Stars: Five of five. Locations: 500 (recently opened several stores in Los Angeles.)



BASKIN-ROBBINS: "Delight in a traditional treat with your favorite ice cream flavors, two banana slices, crowned with chopped almonds, whipped cream and three cherries." About as close to the classic banana split as you can get. But traditional hard ice cream suffers in the age of Haagen-Dazs. Rating: two and a half of five. Price: about $5.00.



TASTEE-FREEZ: Claims to have invented soft-serve. I'm not so sure. But this is high-quality stuff - almost as creamy as Carvel. R ating: four of five. Price: $3.00 About 100 locations, with the most in California, Texas, and Illinois. One in Alaska.



FOSTER'S FREEZE: Weird, yucky, yellow ice milk. This California chain has passed its glory days, though you can find them in - and this is kind of yucky, too - hybridized "El Pollo Loco" stores. Plus, the picture is BOGUS: look at the glass dish. Price: $3.00 Rating: one of five. Locations: About 40.




CULVER'S: This midwestern chain features not ice cream, but creamier frozen custard (whole milk, egg yolks.) Don't forget to eat ten or so of the chain's "Butter Burgers," which taste exactly the way they sound: smooth as meat. Rating: SIX (!!!!) of five. Price: $4.00. Locations: 350.



SONIC DRIVE IN: Another middle-of-America chain. Best known for 1950s-style car hop service, the ice cream is pretty undistinguished (note that the regal sundae is positioned behind some DQ Blizzard-like treat in the picture.) Some stores sell deep-fried pickles. Rating: two of five (add two points if you're pregnant.) Prices: $3.00. Locations: 3,000.

Made in a plant that processes Peanuts®

Once again, scooped by BoingBoing. In Japan, Lucy and Snoopy hawk popcorn with "banana milk" flavor. Picture from Cory Doctorow's flickr stream.

PS, you can't buy the popcorn stateside, but somewhat yummy Nesquik banana milk is only as far as your local Circle-K, AM-PM, or Kum & Go or - and this is kind of weird - United Dairy Farmers convenience store. The latter is the family business that launched the career of Carl Lindner, former chairman of Chiquita.

The fix must have been in at the Texas State Fair!

see original image at flickr.

Every October, culinary masters compete at the Texas State Fair for the "Big Tex" prize - an award for the most fabulous, new recipe for a fried dessert. Though this year's winner - fried cookie dough - sounds lovely, I was bummed to hear that a recipe for Fried Banana Pudding failed to place, especially considering the heart-wrenching tale behind it, according to the Dallas Morning News:

"Although food vendor Debbie Hays and her family were among the vendors who weren't awarded a Big Tex trophy, they said they are still walking tall.

B.W.'s Original Fried Banana Pudding was the invention of Ms. Hays' brother, longtime concessionaire B.W. Morrow, who died of a heart attack earlier this year. His recipe was picked to be in the contest posthumously.

His wife and daughter came to the contest to see how everyone would respond to Mr. Morrow's last fair food contribution, banana pudding wrapped in a tortilla and fried.

The judges said it was deliciously comforting.

"He had worked on creating this for this year's fair," said Mr. Morrow's wife, Judy. "This is a real honor for us to be in the contest. He'd be proud."

Rest in peace, B.W. You've earned your place in the pantheon of the greats.

Eat these

Twinkies are not baked. They cook themselves at room temperature. Until World War II, the filling was made with bananas (huh? Hostess used real flavors?) Then, a shortage of the fruit led to the introduction of today's "white" flavored innards.

Banana Twinkies - Return, oh primal filling - A full Zen circle

An attempt at banana bread...

A pretty common banana tip is that if you've got a bunch that's getting too brown to eat, throw it into the freezer. They'll go black quicker, but they'll last long enough for you to make some delicious banana bread (you have to remove the bananas and let the softening process continue a bit to get the fruit to turn into the gooey glop needed to actually get the baking started.)

Kalee (my gf) made some the other night. She used a variation from Cook's Illustrated's "The Best Recipe" that calls for oversized chunks of unsweetened chocolate to balance the sugariness of the ultra-ripe fruit. Unfortunately, our lovely, 1930s-era, just-serviced oven conked out at the halfway marm, and we had to rush the pan into our toaster oven. (Yikes.)

Surprisingly, the bread turned out just fine - as this get-a-picture-before-its-gone snapshot shows.

Here's a link to a bunch of banana bread recipes, including one with chocolate chips.