Bananas form on larger stalks or stems from the plant. The hands form rings on the stalks or stems. This cluster of bananas is called a hand and would consist of 10 to 20 bananas. Each single banana is called a finger. Typically in a store/market you find under 10 bananas in a hand.

As bananas ripen, the starch in the fruit turns to sugar. Therefore, the riper the banana the sweeter it will taste. Each banana was wrapped in foil and sold for 10 cents. Before that time, bananas came to America on the decks of sailing ships as sailors took a few stems home after traveling in the Caribbean.

Some horticulturists suspect that the banana was the earth’s first fruit. Banana plants have been in cultivation since the time of recorded history. One of the first records of bananas dates back to Alexander the Great’s conquest of India where he first discovered bananas in 327 B.C.

The average American consumes over 28 pounds of bananas each year.