How ripe is ripe? A banana ripeness guide
Most of my recipes say “very ripe bananas”, which isn’t very precise. Here’s what I actually mean — drag the slider through the seven stages.
Leopard
Lots of brown spots — this is where baking starts. Very sweet and easy to mash.
Good for: Classic banana bread · Oat cookies · Cardamom buns
Speeding things up
Put bananas in a paper bag with an apple and close it loosely; they’ll jump a stage in a day or two. In a hurry, bake unpeeled bananas at 200 °C for 15–20 minutes until the skins are black — they’ll be soft and sweet enough for banana bread, though the flavour is a little flatter than naturally ripened ones.
Slowing things down
Once they’re as ripe as you like, move them to the fridge. The skin goes dark quickly but the inside stays the same for several days. Or freeze them — see freezing bananas.