There's an Asian food market that I like to wander around semi-aimlessly. Usually when I go there I'll pick up some variety of frozen buns to steam later. Their fresh veggie section is a little questionable though. Despite that I have to check the produce out because they hang a durian poster that always lures me in with the promise that one day I will try what will most likely be a terribly wretched fruit. Fun! The store is also a treasure trove of exotic condiments that are new and exciting to this culturally stunted Mid-Western farm boy. It is here that I came upon an item called simply Banana Sauce.
A product of the Philippines made by the Jufran company, the sauce is red in color and is housed in a familiar ketchup like bottle. The store I bought it from had two styles: one regular and one labeled hot. Surprise, surprise… I went with the spicier of the two.
Getting the bottle home I did some quick research to find that it is also called banana ketchup and that it is relatively recent product, originally created in the mid 1940's. It was created as a ketchup substitute in response to U.S. G.I.'s being stationed in the Philippines (where there must have been some shortage of tomatoes). It was adopted into a seemingly odd mix of dishes; a topping for fried chicken, mixed with mayo and used as a salad dressing, and as a pasta sauce. I have to tell you about this pasta dish (whoever entered the info on the wiki page calls it a spaghetti dish but I'm not 100% sure if spaghetti is being used generically or specifically. Lets assume for a moment that it is being specific to the spaghetti pasta). So, you have your banana sauce standing in for a marinara then you top with grated cheddar cheese and hot dogs, Vienna sausages, or corned beef. Huh... First time I read that I was puzzled but now that I've had some time to think about it, I might just give it a shot.
Having a taste of the Jufran sauce I found it to be mildly sweet with a hint of heat behind it. It doesn't have a banana taste to it at all. I was afraid to get smacked aside the head with a Laffy Taffy fake banana flavor but I can report that was not the case. That said, what is up with the consistency? It expelles itself out of the bottle with plopping sound that one associates with a semi-congealed swamp creature. Seriously. Does this somehow make me shallow to factor the consistency (and the fascinating sounds effect that goes along with it) into my review? The lumps of this faux-ketcup really didn't bother me too much but the child inside of me wanted to poke it with a stick to make sure it wasn't still alive.
Well what to do with this stuff? After some further looking around the web for what to use the sauce for, I went and purchased some tilapia and a lime. I marinated the fish in the sauce and some lime then tossed each side under the broiler for a few minutes. I give my hastly cooking two and a half 'meh' out of five. Maybe it wasn't the best way to initially explore the subtle nature of the banana sauce. I will be heading back to the kitchen to experiment again.
So far I have nothing negative to say about initial foray into a world where a red banana sauce lives. I think it has one of those flavor profiles that, when you find just the right pairing, it becomes craving. I'll keep working in the Drizzle and Schmear labs to see what I can come up with.
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