Banana Jam

I have these pleasant memories of mum in her kitchen when I was younger, simmering up all kinds of sweety-goodness - grape jam, tomato and passionfruit jam, plum jam, gooseberry jam... I'd often sniff my way into the kitchen, only to get a deft swat with the wooden spoon and told to stay out. Fair enough - hot, sugary liquid burns like hell, and I'm a klutz.

But until recently I'd never tried this myself. My first attempt, nectarine butter, worked well enough, with plenty of room for improvement. Then Mel directed me to this recipe a couple of weeks ago, and I knew I had to try it.

I'd never heard of banana jam before. But it seemed like fate when, last weekend at work, one of the vege stalls was selling banana's for a mere $1 per kilo. It was a sign, I tell you! What else could I do but buy up big?

I used Matt's recipe (can't be bothered typing it up), and it worked well for me. Fair warning is given about licking the spoon, which I fixed by waiting for anything on the spoon to cool slightly before running my finger over it. However I think my idea of "low heat" must be different to other people's - the recipe says the mix takes about 30 minutes to get thick, where mine took a fraction over an hour. I also reduced the amount of cinnamon slightly, and only added a little over a cup of sugar. In any case the results are well worth the effort, I say. Teamed with peanut butter in a toasted sandwich, this is just DIVINE. I still have about a kilo of bananas and some limes, so as soon as I get a few more jars I'll be brewing up another batch!

Oh yes, quantities: this recipe gave me one full small pasta-sauce jar (about 375g, I think?) and about half of another the same size.