It seems I've
fallen in love with you. The more I am imagining you, the more is the craving
to have you. Your crispy yellow color and the smack round looks make you
tempting. Your one time taste makes me irresistible to have you more. You are
versatile in your flavor - sweet, salty, spicy or chocolaty. Your limited
production only in South India has made you a unique mark of their cultural
heritage. The healthy benefits of your consumption are like cherry on the cake.
I'm wondering if my readers could figure out who you are. The Banana Chips...!
Just like the
name suggests, banana chips are a processed form of bananas or plantains aka
nendran; a formal nomenclature in terms of botany. They are an ethnic Kerala
cuisine locally called 'Upperi'. These made-in Kerala chips are available all
over the country now. Just like I talked about their versatility in taste, they
have a variety in their manner of being served as well. If dried, devour it as
a midday snack. If fried, complement your meal with them as a dessert.
The dried chips
are made of dehydrated well ripped bananas having an intense fruity flavor.
They are usually available in plain taste i.e. no artificial flavor add-ons.
The fried ones are made of under-ripe sliced bananas deep-fried in coconut oil
or sunflower oil. Once fried, their serving composition may be enhanced with
sugar coating or salt sprinkling or whatever pleases one's taste buds.
If fried or dried
to the right composure, banana chips do not look any lesser than gold coins. In
fact, they have the golden healthy benefits of their consumption as well.
Bananas in raw form are enriched with mostly all the vitamins and minerals but
giving them a pioneering taste doesn't diminish their nutritional value much
lesser. Rich in potassium, dietary fiber, iron and naturally sugary makes them
a wholesome snack. Higher nutritional value in vitamins and lower in fats makes
the consumption of banana chips over potato chips a little lesser guilty eating
habit.
Just like we have
skilled homely chefs in almost every North Indian family for some finger
licking sweets like Gujiya for Holi or sesame laddus for winters, we have south
Indian family chefs proficient in making banana chips. With our generations
becoming busier in their lives and evolution of technology, banana chips making
has become more of a small scale industrial activity. Still they are an
integral part of traditional Kerala feasts like Sadya or Onam.
An apple a day
keeps the doctor away. Have you ever heard someone saying, "A Banana a day
keeps your workout on way?" Well, gym instructors suggest the die-hard
body building fans to keep the intake of eggs, milk or banana high as it
provides them the sufficient nutrients and energy to stay fit. There must be
people like me who aren't fruit lovers and thus are devoid of grabbing the
required nutrients from a fruity diet. To compensate the loss, we have banana
chips J and thus to keep a balance between a healthy diet and a not-so-high
calorific intake, dried bananas are a suitable compensation.
One-half cup, or
34 grams, of dried chips is equivalent to 1 cup of fresh fruit. The equivalents
contains 4 percent of the daily recommended intake of potassium, 6 percent to 8
percent of magnesium, 3 percent of phosphorus and 4 percent to 6 percent of
vitamin A. Potassium, magnesium and phosphorus function as electrolytes that
help maintain fluid balance. Vitamin A promotes eye health and helps strengthen
your immune system.
A lot has been
talked about healthy dietary benefits of yellow south Indian chips but not
everyone is a fitness freak and we all give ourselves some liberty in food to
please our taste buds often. So why not to experiment a little different
flavored bananas? The fried ones! They have their own expression of taste; be
it with honey syrup or chilli flakes. Imagine yourself ordering a serving of
chocolate syrup banana chips in dessert than the regular ice-cream or milky
items. Trust me you won't be disappointed if you are a foodie like me for whom
food with spiced up flavor is always a delight.
I think it was
more than enough to talk about the fascinations with Banana chips and if you
have managed to read my article till the last byte and you like banana chips
even a bit, you are definitely going to try them out and if you aren't
fascinated at all with this fruit, you need a change to give bananas a try on
how different can they taste apart from the routine fruity flavor.
Deepika Nair
Social media enthusiast and digital marketing executive. A food lover and
writes about health benefits of natural fruits and healthy snacks like Banana
Chips .
0 comments:
Post a Comment