Does ripened fruit have more calories and sugars than unripened fruit?
The other day I was eating a banana and was having a conversation with a friend about how we like to eat ours. I used to like mine with a hint of green but now I fancy the sweeter perfectly yellow ones. Then he asked me if I thought a yellow banana had more sugar and calories than a greener banana.
At first thought, I was like, can fruits even “gain calories” after it is picked off of a tree? Then I was like well the yellow banana must have more sugar than the green one because it TASTES sweeter obviously. But then I was like but wait, sweeter means more sugar and more sugar means more calories. So I was totally stumped.
I looked all over the internet for an answer and the best answer came from Hungry Girl:
”I’ve searched high and low, and have found no evidence that suggests that really ripe fruit contains more calories than less ripe fruit. But, wait! Don’t bite into that squishy brown banana just yet. Though ripeness doesn’t affect a fruit’s calorie count, it does affect the amount of sugar it contains. The more ripe a fruit is, the more concentrated its sugars become. The bottom line is; snacking on super-sweet fruit raises your insulin levels — which will cause you to be hungry again more quickly. Even worse, high insulin levels cause your body to go into fat-storage mode. Eeek!”
Okay but don’t get scared! Eat the banana how you like it. If you only eat 1 banana a day (which most of us do) it is not enough to raise your insulin levels so high that you’ll go into fat storage mode. Remember to not just hone in on the banana, look at everything else you are consuming too. If you’re using a ripe banana in oatmeal because you don’t use any other sweeteners, then you’re probably not using very much sugar in other meals either! (That’s my guess…) At the end of the day, what matters is this: did you enjoy your food and did you eat healthfully for yourself and your goals? I hope so 😉
Question for you!!! How do you guys like your bananas from 1-7 – Green or yellow?
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16 thoughts on “Does ripened fruit have more calories and sugars than unripened fruit?”
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5
I see this is an old post, but I wanted to let you know that fruits can actually get higher in calorie when they ripped, and bananas are actually one of the best example of that. The starch in bananas are a type of resistant starch. And they are resistant to what? Digestion. Meaning that we don’t get much calories from a banana that is green and barely tasted sweet, because it’s only starchy in starch we don’t digest. As it ripped, the starch turns to sugar… which we digest.
So I went from eating my bananas from between 5 and 7 on the scale here to between 3 and 5… no regrets, they taste less sweet but they are also more firm. And because they have resistant starch and less sugar, they are lower on the glycemic index, longer to digest, and they keep me full longer.
4 is perfect for yogurt but let’s wait 1-2 weeks more to make banana pancakes or banana muffins.
4 is perfect!! I’ll eat a 5 too.
7
my preference would be 6 5 7 4. I assume the ripe vs unripe thing would apply to any fruits that ripen after picking. I had a cantaloupe a few days ago that was very good. Soft, nice sweetness, not mushy, just a very good mellon. I bought one yesterday and it was hard and not very sweet. At the time I did not know that cantaloupe ripen after picking. I knew they got soft and mushy but rotting is not the same as ripening. That’s what brought me here. The whole starch vs sugar thing makes sense though as I feel much fuller now than when I ate the other one. Not worth the trade off though. It was a wasted mellon.
A food can not put someone into “fat storage mode.” A net increase in bodyfat can only occur if there is an energy surplus over time (calories in greater than calories out), which is what causes the rate of fat storage to be greater than the rate of fat oxidation. Calorie expenditure is variable (and affected by the type of foods eaten as well), but at the end of the day it’s energy balance and not hormonal fluctuations that determines whether there will be a net gain or loss in bodyfat.
Agreed. The only people who should be concerned with being put into fat storage mode are those with higher levels of insulin resistance or diabetes. Not a factor at all for those with normal insulin levels.
I think your banana color scale shouldn’t be 1-7 green-yellow; instead it should be 1-5-9 green-yellow-brown. Anywhere 4-6 is fine by me.
I like mine at about a 5 or 6:)
Isn’t eating brown bananas against the Old Testament?
I like my bananas at like a 4 or 5!
The starch in green bananas slowly turns to sugar as the banana ripens. This enzymatic conversion of starch to sugar is responsible for the sweet and soft characteristics of brown bananas. While starch and sugar are chemically different molecules, this conversion does not affect the calorie content of a banana, only the perceived sweetness. Both starch and sugar are carbohydrates, providing four calories per gram. The types of sugar present in ripe bananas include glucose, fructose and sucrose. Increased sweetness occurs quickly in the early stages of ripening and continues throughout the ripening process.
Read more: http://www.livestrong.com/article/536169-nutritional-difference-in-ripe-bananas/#ixzz2AJQaa449
Unripe bananas contain starch wich is later on converted to sugars which makes the banana ripe. So a ripe banana contains more calories.
No.
Starch have the same amount of calories as sugar.
But it will keep you full longer.
resistance starch is still a carbohydrate. carbs are what kill. but wait a minute. isn’t the math simple? calories in vs. calories out when dieting? idk the answer.