Banana Ketchup/Catsup - delicious Filipino product and innovation

Filipinos are known for ingenuity and innovativeness. We work on what we have. We tend to be contended with the resources available. However, we are still capable of creating and developing things that some changed the shape of the world.

During the Second World War (WWII), destruction in many areas of the Philippines was evident. Filipino lives at the time were miserable. Roam from place to place to hide from the Japanese invaders. Necessary things were scarce – food, medicines, clothing, utensils. But Philippines is blessed with natural resources, many flora and fauna are endemic to us and not totally destroyed during the war. 

Due to the shortage of imported goods, Filipinos are dependent on the resources at hand. Condiments and food flavoring were modified. One of these modifications was done in catsup or ketchup. Catsup is introduced to the Philippines by the Americans and originally made from tomatoes. Yet, tomatoes at that time were in short of supply. Thus, a Filipino food technologist, chemist, pharmacist, humanitarian and a war heroin Maria Ylagan-Orosa formulated ketchup from bananas together with her other developed food products such as calamansi nip, a desiccated and powdered form of calamansi that could be used to make calamansi juice, banana ketchup, and a powdered preparation of soya-beans called Soyalac, a "magic food" preparation which helped save the lives of thousands of Filipinos, Americans, and other nationals who were held prisoner in different Japanese concentration camps during World War II. She also made contributions in the culinary realm and taught proper preservation methods for native dishes such as adobo, dinuguan, kilawin and escabeche.

Maria Orosa invented the recipe for banana ketchup following the tomato ketchup recipe, more or less. She used a banana variety known as Saba’, vinegar, sugar and spices. Basically, the product is not very appealing because it doesn’t look like the traditional ketchup. It has brownish color. Thus, recent developments in banana ketchup added dye to the sauce to make it more appealing and look like the original tomato counterpart.

Banana ketchup is an ubiquitous condiment in Filipino households and part can be a part in a wide variety of dishes - omelettes (torta), hotdogs, burgers, fries, fish and other meats. It is also a vital and distinct ingredient in Filipino-style spaghetti (sweeter than the traditional Italian spaghetti).

Today, banana catsup are being one of the famous Filipino food product that foreigners admire. It comes in different variety like the hot and spicy version. It is marketed in the brands of Del Monte, UFC, Papa, Jufran, Baron, among others; and exported to countries where considerable Filipino population are located such as the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Hong Kong, France, Switzerland, Australia and New Zealand.

Source: http://www.lemanger.fr/en/index.php/saba-banana-can-do-anything-even-ketchup/          
            http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maria_Y._Orosa
            http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banana_ketchup