Banana Surprise Yumstation: The most 'traumatizing' food gadget this reviewer has ever tried

This story was published Oct. 27, 2016. 

Have you ever peeled a banana, taken a bite, and felt there was something missing? Something perhaps like a gooey filling inside the banana that would spurt out when you chomped on it?

Hey, we've all never been there. But that didn't stop Rhik Samadder, a kitchen gadget reviewer for the Guardian, from testing a device that fills that nonexistent gap in the market. It's called the Banana Surprise Yumstation and it sells for about $30.

Samadder spoke with As It Happens host Carol Off about why the "traumatizing" gadget could change the way you eat bananas forever. 

What rating out of five did you give the Banana Surprise Yumstation?

I gave the Banana Surprise Yumstation a hearty zero marks out of five. It was either five or nothing. There's nothing in between about this gadget.

It's one of the most striking things I've ever seen but it is also one of the most abominable and traumatizing things I've ever tried.

Can you describe this device for us?

The purpose of this gadget is to let people fill bananas with their own filling.

It's a sort of long tubular, curved cradle that you insert a banana into, which has got a hole in the end.

Then there is a selection of curved sort of straws, coring straws, that you then insert down the banana. They're curved so they can follow the trajectory of the banana, or they're meant to. They create this well through the middle of the banana — running all the way through it.

Then you can use a teated bottle, which is also included, to pump in any filling you'd like.

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You can use toffee, or cream, or other fruit. On the box they've pictured … I think it's jam. It looks a lot like blood — this child holding up a blood-filled banana — which is just one of the reasons why this is such a traumatizing instrument.

I tried some toffee sauce and I'm quite ashamed to say it was not too bad actually. It was one of the messier meals I've eaten and I didn't feel great about myself while I was doing it.

I attempted some jam as well and that was like there had been an emergency in the emergency room.

It feels strange knowing that I live in a world with this Banana Surprise Yumstation in it. It's a very upsetting thing.

You said in your column that it resembles a "My First Urology Kit."

There's definitely something about it. There's just something about the cradle which just looks like it's meant to receive a banana or anything else you may want to shove up there. The curved kind of straw that you push down the tip of the banana — they're all quite upsetting.

There's a thing, a sort of swabbing stick, that you push down the hollows of the straws to clean them. There's a lot of plastic tubes going into things and coming out of things. You're pumping fluids into other fluids. It's just a very messy, sticky, horrifying affair.

You'd actually be better off just putting a straw down a banana with your bare hand. The fact that this thing has been designed at all makes me think it has some sort of dark ulterior purpose.

Is this the worst gadget you've ever reviewed?

It's certainly up there. There's a bit of a debate at the moment.

I reviewed something called the Egg Master last year, which is a vertical grill that you crack eggs into. Then when they cook inside they rise out of the top of this sort of phallic tube grill. It's like a hideous pit monster — a long phallic tube of egg rising on its own volition.

That was a tremendous success and very popular.

I'd say it's a tie between the Egg Master and the Banana Surprise Yumstation.

This Q&A has been edited for length and clarity.