Homemade Banana Chips

The instructions were simple: Slice banana into thin chips, dip in lemon juice and spread on a cookie sheet. Bake for 2 hours @ 200 degrees and flip. Bake for another 1.5-2 hours or until crisp. 

Who doesn't have a few overripe bananas on the kitchen counter once in awhile? You hate to throw them out.

I'd had this recipe a few weeks now and decided today would be the perfect time to make the Banana Chips. What could be easier?

Below is a photo with the recipe.

I sliced thin three bananas, dipped them in lemon juice and placed on a cookie sheet as directed. Since I feared they might stick, I lined the pan with aluminum foil.

I baked as directed and here's the final product. Hmm, definitely not as appealing-looking as advertised.

However, they are quite tasty, but do not taste like the ones you buy at the store. To me, those taste salty; these do not. 

But they don't taste like bananas either! They are tangy, like lemon juice. That's not too much of a problem because I love the taste of lemon.

But now I'll tell you the rest of the story:

The chips were stuck tightly on the foil when I flipped them, so much so that I had to take my fingers and pull them loose.

After four hours in the oven they were NOT crisp; just leathery. And they were stuck VERY tightly to the foil.

Since they're leathery (moisture still resides within), they'lll have to be refrigerated to prevent mold from forming.

And what the heck is all that brownish red stuff on the foil? banana juice? I didn't know bananas had juice. So it has to be the lemon juice. Did I use too much?

So I'm thinking about how this situation could be remedied, if there's a next time.

Maybe spraying the pan with oil would have worked better than lining it with aluminum foil.

Maybe cooking them on a cooling rack would allow the air/heat to circulate and would produce a crisp, not leathery chip.

And maybe I won't make them again at all.

Maybe I'll just make a banana smoothie instead.

Live and learn.