You read correctly, this is ketchup without tomatoes. And confusingly, they replaced the tomatoes with bananas. I’m not sure how that was the logical jump, but sure why not.
“Crap! We’re out of tomatoes! What’s close enough…. uh.. uhhh… BANANAS! Brilliant!“
People dip their fries in chocolate shakes, why not pour bananas on fries? Let’s give it a shot!
I picked this bottle up at the local Asian market in the Filipino section. It looks exactly like ketchup, minus the picture of bananas on the label. It’s not at all chunky like I expected from a condiment made from bananas. It doesn’t taste anything like bananas either! It tastes like ketchup, but sweeter. They almost hit it dead on, but they seemed to forget a good deal of the vinegar that gives ketchup it’s tang.
So now that we’ve determined that it’s ketchup, the next obvious question is: WHY?!? Apparently this was invented during the Japanese occupation of the Philippines during the mid 1940’s. They couldn’t get their hands on American ketchup, so they made their own. It seems like they use it the same as we do for the most part. One interesting use for it though is in Filipino spaghetti. No spaghetti sauce and meatballs here. They use straight up banana sauce with hot dogs or vienna sausages, topped with grated cheddar. Sounds like it was invented in a college dorm. And by that, I mean delicious.