reba, I'd feel safe with a USDA recipe from that recently. That full cup of oil is cut with THREE cups of strong acid. I think the magic Ellie works is simply that she worked on developing the recipes and had some recources to TEST them while doing so. The reason for caution about untested recipes isn't that they're known to cause illness, but that they haven't been demonstrated scientifcally to be 100% safe. The bar most home canners want for safety is a 100% guarantee that there won't be a food safety problem if they follow the recipes. (Botulism is such a horribly serious condition that few people want even the teeniest chance of contracting it---after all, home canning is associated with fun, health, and generous gifting.) It's comapratively easy to devise a safe recipe with nothing but fruit, sugar, and acid ingredients. Most combinations of those are going to test perfectly fine on the first try. But combinations involving low-acid ingredients, oil, and thickeners, while not necessarily always UNsafe, presumably often need more tries to find a combo that is both tasty and proven to be completely risk-free. There just aren't a lot of resources committed to developing and testing new canning recipes, presumably because the canning lobby is pretty small and not exactly wealthy and politically powerful. So other than the company that sells canning products, which puts out a few new recipes a year, and the occasional cash-strapped extension office, there aren't a lot of places testing recipes, TRYING to find safe ways of making stuff some of us want to make, like low-sugar or low-acid or fat-involving items. That's why I love Auntie Ellie. She had a cable show in Canada for a while; it was called PUT A LID ON IT (her book is a combination of two earlier books tied to the show and called PUT A LID ON IT 1 and 2), and many of the recipes apparently were created for the show. Presumably the advertising revenue is where the money came from for the testing, and there seems to have been some cooperation with Health Canada, as they are noted as having approved her method for making flavoured oils as a safe one. Clearly what we need is a new canning tv show! Ideally, a U.S. prime-time reality show---THINK of the $$ they would have for recipe development! Way more than some measly Canadian cable show. I foresee a new career for our Annie as celebrity host! ;-) Zabby

I never realized that these are so similar to what I call "Butter Balls" and others call "Mexican Wedding Cakes" - really scrumptious! (Someone pointed out the similarity somewhere today on either the R/E or the C/F - anyway, this would be easier, you don't have to roll, and roll, and roll!)

Brown Rice Syrup - is half as sweet as sugar, so equal amounts of agave nectar would be way too sweet, but 1/3 or 1/2 that amount would probably work. Brown rice syrup is also much thicker than agave nectar, so you may have a hydration difference you'll need to correct in the dough/batter. A 50/50 mix of agave nectar and molasses or 100% cane syrup would work. The mild-flavored agave nectar would help cut the taste of molasses or cane syrup which are very strong to be using in large amounts. Especially compared to mild-tasting brown rice syrup. I'd be inclined to use Golden Syrup (Lyle's Golden Syrup is one brand). It's another cane sugar syrup and is thicker than honey/agave nectar/maple syrup and has a mild flavor like brown rice syrup, but will be a little sweeter than brown rice syrup. Dancinglemons suggestion to use 100% Pure Cane Syrup is a good one (I use Steen's brand), but it adds a lot more flavor than you find in brown rice syrup. Personally, I just plain disliked the flavor of brown rice syrup. * Raw Sugar - is refined to produce pure sucrose (which is still plain old sugar). Turbinado or your C&H Raw Sugar will work well as a substitute. Sucanat would also work. Sugar is sugar (sucrose). The size of the granules is what you'll find different in this case, plus a little of the natural color and minerals. If you find the more "natural" forms of sugar aren't dissolving well, you can give it a quick zip in a blender or small food processor and it will become "powdered" sugar and will dissolve better. Raw date sugar isn't a good substitute in my opinion, since it doesn't "act" like sugar in cooking and baking. It's okay to add to a topping, such as a crumb topping, but the chemistry of sugar just isn't there for baked goods. It doesn't dissolve readily (you usually need to dissolve date sugar in water before use and it still leaves a large amount of solids that never dissolves), it will ALSO add a great deal of date flavor, and it burns VERY easily. I'm with dancinglemons, I also avoid high fructose syrup and wouldn't use Karo (and haven't for many years now). From past experience using brown rice syrup, Karo would also be much sweeter. White Karo would have the least flavor, but more sweetness than brown rice syrup. -Grainlady

Lack of acid is one reason peaches and papayas don't "gell" all that well. But I just greatly prefer the taste of a jam or preserve without the added pectin and extra sugar it requires. So I have learned to live with runny peach preserves. One trick is to macerate the fruit overnight in the sugar and then take it out and boil the sugar syrup down before adding the fruit back in. That helps your fruit hold its shape in the jam better. That's what's known as the "old fashioned" method of making preserves. I think that is to contrast with the "newer" methods which rely on commercial pectin. I didn't answer because I don't know anything about papayas. I know they sub for peaches in quick breads and the like, but I didn't know about canning. Since they are not recommended to sub for peaches in peach salsa, I didn't know about jam. Somewhere I thought I recalled seeing a chart that listed the acidity levels of various fruits, but I can't remember where. I do know that guidelines for canning papayas are not listed in my old Ball Blue Book of Canning although I would guess perhaps they are in the newer ones. I assumed that with the sugar and acid levels you would be ok. I seem to recall using a bit of mango in that chutney we made, but it was high sugar, high acid with a lot of added vinegar. I don't know much about mangos, I have a tendancy to cut myself trying to get the fruit off of them so I don't buy them lol!