Quite bananas

The summer has really hit us, here in the UK, and that means BBQing almost every day. Not only have I been hitting the grill most evenings I've also been invited to a few over the last couple of weekends. 

A couple of weeks ago my uncle held one at quite short-notice, and unfortunately I didn't bring anything. Huge faux pas I admit, but there really wasn't any time. 


My uncle moaned about the fact I came empty-handed, and that he was expecting some awesome dessert. 

Well the following week the same happened, only this time I came fully prepared with an epic banoffee pie. 

The whole thing came together pretty easily. The only issue I end up having when putting together pies is I bought the biggest pie tin I could find. Beyond thinking having a huge tin would be brilliant, I can't really think of a reason how I justified it. 

Well I'm lumbered with it, which makes me a Kingston amongst fellow BBQ guests when I come bearing gifts. It is though a bit of a pain. 

For the recipe I followed this one from the Guardian. I had to up the digestive biscuit count, used caramel and opted out of the pecans. 

I'm not sure what banoffee pie purists will think of that but I can't abide nuts in my food. Nuts belong by themselves in a bowl or locked away in a jar. I don't need nuts in my food. Unless of course it's pine nuts, in which case I can't get enough. 

I love dulce de leche and I think it would have been lovely in the pie. I just couldn't be bothered to spend hours making it. 

At this point you may be wondering why I'd make dulce de leche when you can buy it in a jar. A tin of condensed milk is far cheaper than buying dulce de leche. And yes I'm not factoring in the cost of keeping the hob on four three hours but Indians don't do that. We just see the price on the shelf. 

I never understood why cooks/chefs insist on laying out the bananas in an over-elaborate way. It's getting covered in cream, no one is going to see if you've made a cross-hatch demi-pattern. 

I say just lay them out so you fill the pie as much as you can. No one will ask why you didn't go for the helix method. 

Everyone at the BBQ loved the pie and half of it was gobbled up before I knew what was going on. I felt it was much better the next day. With 24 hours resting in the fridge the pie is given time to absorb and intensify all those flavours. 

Give it a go and let me know how it comes out.