Recipe adapted from Heidi Swanson’s Super Natural Cooking: Five Ways to Incorporate Whole & Natural Ingredients into Your Cooking, available at Linden Hills Natural Home. Serve fig spread with walnut bread or as an accompaniment to cheese.

1 ½ lbs ripe fresh black Mission figs
(stemmed and cut into ¼ inch dice)
¼ cup freshly squeezed lemon juice
1/3 cup honey
¼ tsp freshly ground black pepper, plus more as needed
¼ cup toasted unhulled sesame seeds

Toss the chopped figs and lemon juice together in a large bowl. Stir in the honey and black pepper and set aside for 10 minutes. The figs will start to break down and get soupy. Pour the fig mixture into a large, heavy pot over medium heat and bring to a slow gurgling boil. Cook, stirring constantly, until the figs start to reduce and thicken, about 10-15 minutes. Stir in the sesame seeds and remove from the heat. Let the spread sit for 5 minutes, taste, and add more pepper to taste if needed.