Instant Expert: Oh, the things you can do with bananas and onions

So let's get hacky, downright food hacky!

Now, before you think I've gone off the rails, I'm talking food hacks.

Hacks can be tips, tricks or shortcuts that will make your life easier, more efficient or even fun. It's jazzing up something you do every day.

I decided to learn some food hacks that concern my constant kitchen companions, the banana and the onion. 

They've been in my life so long sometimes I don't show them the love and respect they deserve.

Canadians devour about three billion bananas a year. Or maybe, like my Gram, they're just making a lot of banana bread.

Did you know?

Let's start with some banana background.

Bananas are 75 per cent water. There are more than 1,000 varieties of bananas in the world. There are bananas that would give the Kardashian sisters a run for their fashion style, but unlike the Kardashians, bananas have something inside.

(Kim, Kourtney and Khloe — don't bother emailing me. I'm not talking to you since we all showed up at Tim Hortons wearing the same outfit.)

There are fuzzy Double Bubble pink bananas, green-and-white striped bananas with flesh the colour of orange sherbet, candy-apple "Manzano" bananas and bananas that when cooked, taste just like strawberries. There are red bananas that have to turn black before they're ripe and have a slight raspberry flavour or an aromatic vanilla flavour.

But being an old-fashioned Wanita-Banana, I'll eat the North American banana, a.k.a. the "Cavendish," yellow on the outside and white on the inside. It's described as a "dessert" banana.

The drama! 

If this were a fairy tale, it would be Goldilocks and the Three Bananas.

Opening scene: me in my kitchen. 

"Oh, this banana is too green and tastes like paste and makes a funny sound when I try to eat it."

"Now, this banana is the colour of dirt and when I peel it, it's so soft that it oozes out and it's too mushy to eat."

"Look at this banana! It is almost all yellow with a small amount of green at both ends. It's the perfect eating colour."

Banana hacks you can use

When you get your bananas home from the store, wrap the stem in tinfoil or plastic wrap. Some people separate the bananas and wrap each one individually, but the single hat on the bunch works as well.

This will slow down the production of ethylene, the gas that makes them and other fruits ripen.

There are two ways to speed up banana ripening. You can place the bananas in a brown paper bag, which also works with avocados. This is not the super quick way but should ripen them in a day or so.

If you are in a rush, turn the oven to 300 F. Place the bananas on parchment paper on a cookie sheet. Pop them in the oven, and check after 30 minutes, and if they are not ripe enough, put them back in for another 10 minutes or so. Check them often and don't be alarmed when the peels turn black, because they certainly will. Be happy you are not eating the skins.

The best banana hack I have learned is how to peel a banana like a monkey. Who would know better?

Hold the banana by the peel and pinch the other end. Easy peasy, the banana is good to go!  

Bananas on the dark side are not bad. They're just brown bananas waiting to be made into something yummy. Pop these dirt-brown bananas into the freezer, skins and all. Take them out, thaw them and use them in your favourite recipes.

They're great for banana bread or muffins, smoothies or banana pancakes. I've heard it said that the browner the banana, the better the banana bread.

Perhaps my friend, Jane the baker, has the best banana hack of all. She says, "Shop often, buy few."

Personalized bananas

Take a toothpick and scratch a message or your name on a banana. It will stay almost invisible for about an hour. Then magic, your message will appear. There are even banana artists. 

Take My Banana Peel, Please:  Rub the inside part of the banana peel on a mosquito bite to take away the itch. Shine your shoes with it.

Or as you can see in this photo of me, rub it over your teeth to whiten them.

I can neither confirm nor deny that any of this works.

A 10-step program for bananas

Bananas have a 10-step "colour" process they go through.

• 1: bright green and just off the plant
• 2: still bright green
• 3: bright green but turning yellow
• 4: greenish-yellow (this is the colour retailers order)
• 5: 75 per cent yellow and green tipped on both ends (the best time to buy)
• 6: all yellow, green tips gone
• 7: ripe with some brown specks (also called sugar specks)
• 8: riper again with more brown specks
• 9: brown (good for cooking)
• 10: super brown/almost black (good for cooking)

Crying over onions

Oh most delicious vegetable and long time friend of mine, why do you make me cry so? This love-hate relationship I have with onions has got to stop.

I love to eat them, but hate to cut them up. Why, why do you make me cry like a baby?

Here's why! When you cut an onion it releases a gas. When that is mixed with certain enzymes in the onion, it creates sulfur gas. These dang gases get to your eyes and create a mild acid.

Now usually your body would say, close your eyes, this hurts… not a great idea, if you're standing there with a knife in your hand. So the next best thing is to produce tears and try to wash away that nasty sensation.  

Unless you want to give up on the glorious taste of onions, you need some tips on how to stop those tears.

10 ways to deal with onions

Here are ten onion-worthy hacks you can try.

• 1. Light a candle. How romantic.
• 2. Use a sharp knife. Be careful!
• 3. Refrigerate the onion for a few hours before you cut it.
• 4. Wash the onion before you peel them. Although this might just make the onion slippery, and then you end up chasing it around the cutting board.
• 5.  Don't open your mouth while cutting the onion. This one has me lying on the floor with the onion laughing at me from the cutting board.  
• 6. Cut them under a kitchen fan or vent. This is the one that I use. And it works.
• 7. Ask someone else to cut them. Someone you obviously don't like that much!
• 8. Buy them precut in the produce section.  Big spender!
• 9. Leave them out of the recipe! If you don't really care about how good your food will taste, do this one.
• 10. Mark Spitz it and wear swimming goggles! You may look really silly but there'll be no tears in your supper tonight.

So there you have it! Go on and try some of these hacks.

Keep Calm and Banana and Onion On!