What is in a Banana?

What is in a banana?  At first glance it may seem like a silly question to ask what is in banana.  A banana is just a banana, right?  Well, not exactly.  Too often we hear or read food/diet 'advice' warning us to not eat this or not eat that.  Quite often it's said that you should not eat anything with non-natural ingredients or something that has too many ingredients or something that has ingredients you can't pronounce.  Most of this 'advice' is nothing but a bunch of rubbish.

Take the claim that you should avoid food with ingredients you can't pronounce, for example.  Whether or not you can pronounce an ingredient has no bearing on whether the ingredient is something you should eat.  To think so is simply nonsense.  Take the banana.  A banana is a banana and you often see bananas as key ingredients in some food items.  But what makes up the composition of a banana?  The results may surprise you.

I freely admit I have no clue on the composition of a banana, but it's easy enough to look up.  So here you go.  Drum roll please.  The ingredients of a banana are:

Hmmm...I can pronounce water and sugar, but most of the ingredients in an all-natural banana are a mystery to me!  However, that should never stop me from eating a banana.  In fact, I ate one earlier today, and I'll probably eat another tomorrow because there's a few on my kitchen counter right now.

The moral of this story is to not fall for the outrageous claims to "fix" your diet and make you live a long healthy life.  Despite everything out there on diets, it basically boils down to eating lots of fruits and vegetables, limiting your intake of sugars and red meats, and exercise.  That's still the best way to maintain a healthy lifestyle.