Banana-Tamarind

Our combination of banana and tamarind came about because of several coinciding developments.  First of all we were working with a tamarind sauce balanced with maple syrup and orange juice.  The was flavorful though the consistency was off.  I was looking for an atypical thickener and noticed some slightly under ripe bananas.  I folded these bananas into the tamarind base and allowed the mixture to cook down and the flavors to marry.  When the bananas had taken in a fair amount of the tamarind I pureed the mixture into what had the consistency of chocolate pudding.  I reserved some of the mixture to make chips and cooled the rest down for later use.  The thickening qualities of the banana created a dense gelatin like base.  (I can actually dice the banana tamarind in its chilled state.)  The  banana acted not only as a thickener but also a soft medium to tame the intensity of our tamarind sauce. We first used the banana-tamarind with crispy bass, though many more combinations are in the works.