Banana Toffee Pie (Banoffe pie)

When you come across the same dish in 4 different blog, all in a single day, then think no more. Its the great baker in the sky telling you that its time you made that dish. And hey, who am I to question the great baker's plans? and so I made the Banoffe pie, which is simple banana and toffee mashed up together, much like in this dessert. Its decadent, its rich and its most definitely yummy. Its true that you cant eat too many helpings cause it is frankly a sickly sweet recipe and you can get satiated with one slice but thats only a problem, if you are just making this pie for yourself. One the other hand if it is for a dinner party, then you wouldnt know where the dessert disappeared! Here are the things you need,

• 4-5 medium ripe bananas
• 400 mils of double cream
• 1/2 cup sugar and 3tbsp butter
• 3 tbsp water
• 1 tin condensed milk
• 250 grams of digestive biscuits
• 125 gram butter

Method:

1. In a blender/food processor, mix together the digestive biscuits and butter until they form coarse crumbs.
2. Press the biscuit crumbs onto a springform tin to form the base. Remember to press the crumbs on to the sides of the tin. 
3. Refrigerate for 1/2 an hour
4. In the meanwhile, on low heat melt together the sugar and water. Stir until all the sugar is dissolved.
5. Then raise the heat to medium and leave the sugar undisturbed for 5 minutes or until it begins to caremelize.
6. Now quickly add the condensed milk and butter and whisk until the toffee sauce thickens.
7. Then remove the rested pie shell from the fridge and pour half of the sauce all over it, including the sides. 
8. Refrigerate it for a further half an hour.
9. Now chop the bananas into medium sized slices and whip the cream to form still peaks
10. Fold the bananas into the cream
11. Spread the cream evenly over the biscuit and toffee base
12. Pour the remaining toffee sauce over the cream and refrigerate for another 1/2 an hour.
13. Then dig in!

You could omit steps 4,5,6 and make toffee sauce another way. All you need to do is remove the label from the tin of condensed milk and then immerse the tin in a pot water and place that pot on low heat (simmer) for about 2 and half hours and then when you crack open the tin of condensed milk, voila! its toffee sauce! :) While, this is a far easier process it is a lot more time consuming. So, choose your method according to your convenience. The result is just the same though!

Also, one way to reduce the sweetness of the dessert if its a tad too much for you would be to use, just ripe bananas instead of medium or overtly ripe ones. This way, the lack of sweetness in the bananas will help even out the overall sweetness of the dessert.

For the base, try using salted butter instead of unsalted butter, as the saltiness of the biscuit plus the butter forms and interesting clash with the sweetness of the toffee sauce.

 Remember to wear stretch pants ore PJs when you eat the dessert. Why you ask, you will know! This dessert might even make you wish for spandex! :P