A friend of mine recently gave me a banana blossom. 

I had never seen one before so I had to find out how to prepare and eat it. The process is fascinating and isn’t hard. It just takes a bit of time.

The blossom grows at the end of each cluster of bananas. 

By Daniela Kloth – Own work, GFDL 1.2, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=73500454

They look and smell amazing. 

There are two parts of the blossom that can be eaten. Part two is the inner heart which we get to as we peel away the tough purple outer leaves.

Part one though consists of the many long thin florets that would grow to be fruit. You can see them in the next two images. They need to be stripped of their pistil and hard outer layer and immediately put in salty water or a citrus, water and vinegar solution. Otherwise they discolour rapidly.

Once prepared and soaked they loose their initial bitterness and are great in stirfries.

Eventuall you get to the tender leaves and pale heart. They also need soaking for a few hours. 

I then sliced the heart and leaves inor rings and used them in a thai fish curry.

Enjoy,

PK

Here are some more Southeast-Asian cuisine and curry posts.