The banana is not only the best-known sports fruit among top athletes, the whole of the Netherlands loves it. Seven out of ten men and six out of ten women think that a banana gives extra energy during exercise. And one in three even say they perform better during exercise if they ate a banana. This is apparent from the PLUS banana survey among more than a thousand Dutch people.
Yet there appears to be quite a bit of ignorance about the number of calories in a banana. The research shows that one in five Dutch people believe that a ripe banana contains more calories than an unripe banana. "Nonsense," said the dietitian. “The riper the banana, the more short carbohydrates – read:sugars – it contains, so the faster the energy can be absorbed into your body. But in principle it does not matter for the number of calories.” One banana contains about 120 calories and just a large percentage of the daily required vitamins and minerals.” A banana contains fourteen percent of the daily recommended amount of potassium, ten percent for magnesium and 25 percent of your vitamin B6 requirement.
The banana is not only popular in combination with sports; nine out of ten just like bananas. Nearly a third call it their favorite fruit. Nearly one in ten eat a banana every day and one in five say they can't live without bananas. Seven out of ten almost always have bananas at home. When we go out, we often take a banana for ourselves or the family. And for more than sixty percent of the babies, the banana is the first fruit they eat.
How do the Dutch like to eat their banana? Banana bread and smoothies are popping up all around you. But although 77 percent believe that the fruit is versatile in terms of preparation, 87.3 percent prefer to eat it right out of the box. We just don't agree on when to eat our banana:almost four in ten think ripe bananas are better than unripe ones; the same number prefers immature ones.
