What To Do With Ripe Bananas
I mentioned in my Pillsbury fast dinner ideas post on Friday that I run a golf course snack stand. Well, last week was unseasonably hot. We got some nice, just getting yellow bananas, on Tuesday. By Wednesday morning they were already turning brown from the heat! The kitchen was reading over 100 degrees. Yep, it was hot. Funny though how tropical fruit can hate heat. I can’t stand to just throw food away, so I bagged all of the bananas up to bring home with me. It was at least three bunches, but I already had other bananas at home that I had frozen to use for cooking. I started thinking about what to do with ripe bananas. I figured if I put more in the freezer Jason would think that I needed serious help! I’m sure I’m not the only one who doesn’t always know what to do with ripe bananas, so I’ve compiled a ton of different banana recipes that you can use for ripe bananas.
Bread
Most of us think about making banana bread when we have a lot of ripe bananas sitting around. There are a lot of different banana bread recipes though, so you really can take your pick of what ones sound best to you (or what ones are easiest to make). Here are a few different bread recipes…
Egg Free Banana Bread (Rock-A-Bye Parents) – This is Nick’s go to lunch. You can replace the applesauce with two eggs if you don’t want to make it egg free.
Banana Bread (Nut Free) (Southern Kissed)
Banana Bread with Walnuts (Life with Lisa)
Low Fat Banana Bread (Kiddies Corner Deals)
Muffins
After bread we often think of using ripe bananas to make muffins. I have found that there are a lot of banana muffin recipes out there. Here are some favorites…
Banana Zucchini Spice Muffins (Play 2 Learn With Sarah)
Oatmeal Banana Muffins (Contest Corner)
Orange Banana Muffins (Diaries of a Domestic Goddess)
Banana Carrot Muffins (Project Procrastinot)
Here are two recipes for Chocolate Chip Banana Muffins. I decided to include both since the recipes are quite different.
Chocolate Chip Banana Muffins (Play 2 Learn With Sarah)
Chocolate Chip Banana Muffins (Creative K Kids)
Cake
I must say that cake was far from the first thing I thought of when I was trying to decide what to use my bananas for, but I actually found quite a few cake recipes…
Banana Cream Pie Ice Box Cake (Food Family Finds)
Banana Sheet Cake (Food Family Finds)
Banana Cream Pie Cake Push Pops (Food Family Finds)
Baby Banana Cakes with Vanilla Caramel Glaze (Mom Foodie)
Double Chocolate Banana Split Cake (Mom Foodie)
Pancakes/Waffles
There are other ways to bake with bananas for breakfast that don’t involve a type of bread…
Paleo Pancakes (OhRheally.com)
Peanut Butter and Banana Waffle Bites (Food Family Finds)
Smoothies
Of course smoothies are wildly popular, and ripe bananas are perfect for them…
Very Berry Banana Smoothie (Cookies & Clogs)
Banana Spic Smoothie (Life with Lisa)
Other
There are so many recipes that you can make with ripe bananas, and many are ones you might never think of. Here are a few of my favorite different ones…
Fake Chocolate-Peanut Butter-Banana Ice Cream (From the Burbs to the Boonies)
Strawberry-Banana Nutella Cookies (Food Family Finds)
Strawberry-Banana Fruit Leather (Food Family Finds)
Biscoff Banana Swirl Sweet Rolls (Mom Foodie)
Grandma’s Banana Jam (Mom Foodie)
Hi from Way Back Wednesday! I just made chocolate chip banana muffins with my ripened bananas! The fruit leather sounds neat. That’s the first time I’ve heard of using bananas in it.
Maybe I shouldn’t go through comments while I’m hungry. Now I really want some muffins! LOL It’s amazing what you can make with ripe bananas isn’t it? Love them!
I would of said the same thing which is make banana bread with them they are much easier to mash up for mixing wise. Also I heard you can make banana ice cream with ripe bananas.
I will definitely be doing some of these. I always have ripe bananas and don’t always want to eat them just so.
Some great ideas here, thank you for including me!
Ooh I like the idea of cake made with bananas!!
This is a great list!
Thank you for stopping by the Thoughtful Spot Weekly Blog Hop this week. We hope to see you drop by our neck of the woods next week!
That’s a great link up you’ve got there, I’m always wondering what to do with bananas. Thanks for linking up to Sweet and Savoury Sunday, stop by and link up again. Have a great weekend!!
Smoothies are my favorite!! Thanks for sharing at the Thoughtful Spot Blog Hop!
I think bananas are magical. What else is actually better when it is rotten? I make cookies out of browning bananas that my kids love, using only bananas, chocolate chips, and oats. No added eggs, flour, sugar, or oil. They are surprisingly yummy!
Joining from the All Things Thursday blog hop!
Those sound like really yummy cookies. Anything with banana in it is good though, and they are so useful.
Love this ripe banana roundup! I totally relate to the tropical heat issue. I JUST told my husband the same thing last week (we are living down in Brazil) and for the life of me, I CANNOT keep up with the ripening fruit (especially bananas). It literally is overnight sometimes, lol. Thanks for sharing. I will definitely be looking this over more thoroughly later!
Have a great week! found you at castparty WED
I always think it’s funny how a tropical fruit can “not” like hot temperatures. Now it’s cold here and I can hardly get the bananas to ripen! You just can’t win some days.
Hi Elizabeth, saw you on DIY Sunday Showcase.
Thank you so much for the banana recipe sources! I can’t bear to waste them either!
Have a great day!
Val @ artsybuildinglady.blogspot.ca
Lawd. We always have ripe bananas sitting around. I’m partial to a one bowl banana bread recipe on Simply Recipes(.com) … but honestly, there’s only so much banana bread a person can take and after awhile it feels like I’m just throwing MORE ingredients at the bananas so I can throw away the BREAD later… this will open up options. Love it.
Thanks for linking up with Spread the Love!
Hey thanks a “bunch” for these wonderful ideas!! I have some ripe bananas sitting on cupboard as I write this. Now, thanks to you, I am ready to put those little lovelies to work! :>)
Visiting from SITS Girls- Love the ideas- I do bread, muffins and smoothies, but hadn’t really thought about pancakes and waffles! Way to change it up! I also break down and freeze some of them. I never seem to buy the right number of bananas to serve my purposes…
That’s what I thought when I started finding all the different recipes. It’s amazing what you can do with ripe bananas.
When we have overripe bananas, we either make banana bread (I will have to try out some of your suggested recipes), or we peel and freeze them. When making smoothies, we take out the frozen bananas and toss them in the mixer. It works just as well as fresh.
I just LOVE bananas! Thanks for including my recipe. Going to check out some others 🙂 What a great list.
You’re very welcome Rhea. We’re big banana people too, so they’re always in the house. I need to use them more for just banana bread though!
I like to freeze them, and later use them in smoothies instead of ice.
What a great idea! That would be good for us. We’re not ice people, so we never have it in the house. Last time we went to get ice out of the tray we found that it had been there so long that most of it had evaporated!
Every neighbor within a 5 mile radius of me gives me their old bananas in exchange for banana bread. I must bake 3-4 loaves per week. I need other options! Thanks for giving me some!
How nice of you to make banana bread for everyone. It is really yummy. It’s nice to mix things up every once in awhile though.
Great list! When I think of ripe bananas I always think of banana bread, its nice to see other options!
Right? I couldn’t believe that different types of recipes I found for bananas. I never would have ever thought of some of them.
I totally need to try those sweet rolls from Mom Foodie – yum!
We do too. We’re big sweet roll fans.
This is the best round up I’ve seen for old bananas. My kiddo eats a banana EVERY morning with peanut butter so I buy a lot at a time and sometimes they get old too fast, so I am always freezing them, knowing I’ll use them somehow. I will come back here 🙂 And thank you for using my link.
They can get old fast. I used to have a lot of old bananas to use, and then Nick decided that he liked eating an actual banana, so now I don’t have a lot of old ones. Good thing I can get them from work!
This is seriously SUCH a great resource…love it!
Pancakes! That’s a great idea!
Thank you for including my recipe!