How to Freeze Bananas

Bananas are $.19/lb at Jewel this week. And Tony’s has them for $.39/lb. And you will probably find them around that price at other stores as well. No matter where you buy them, Checkout 51 has $.25 cash back on bananas.

So many of us will buy a nice big bunch of bananas for next to nothing this week and end up with this in a few days, right? This is actually an entire bunch that had been sitting on my counter, untouched, since it was purchased. I know we don’t go through them but I like to have them around for baking, smoothies, etc. Update: And as Rachel reminded me, dairy free chocolate peanut butter banana ice cream! So I happily let them get like this, perfectly sweet, but not the greatest texture to just eat as is. They apparently last a little longer if you separate them, but I actually wanted this bunch to ripen quickly as I was out of frozen bananas I like to have for smoothies.

Most of us know we can use them after this point, but making that practical isn’t so obvious. You could just throw them in the freezer in the peel. That isn’t terrible if you are going to bake with them and let them thaw before peeling, but if you want to use them frozen, it won’t work as well.

The solution: peel and freeze! That way you can use them as they are for a smoothie or let them thaw and make banana muffins or whatever is on your menu. They also still break apart easily in their frozen state so you can use partial bananas with no trouble if that is what you need.

I could have fit the last two in there, but I let the first four freeze completely first before I added them on top. That way, I still got away with using one freezer bag, but they didn’t freeze in a big mass and were still easily separated. As you can see below, I removed one from the top layer without any trouble:

So buy those extra bananas without worrying about whether they will be eaten before they pass the level of ripeness you like. And save yourself a trip to the store next time you want a baked or frozen treat!

Be sure to check back each week for something new! I will be bringing you how-tos, advice, and articles on everything pertaining to easy frugal living: From DIY, to recipes, to practical tips and tricks. To help balance out the couponing and deal chasing we do a lot of here, I’ll talk about easy ways to incorporate frugality into everyday life and to do more from scratch.