Pie in the sky

Banoffee Pie is one of the great dessert indulgences. Not one for the dairy intolerant, but if you like all things banana, caramel and cream, you'll love it. This recipe comes from Café Sopra (another one of my favourite places to eat out), it's truly delicious and is as easy as it looks. I made it for the first time recently to take to a friends house for lunch and it got the big thumbs-up from everyone. It's worth a go—just beware, you may become addicted...

 

Café Sopra's Banoffee Pie

Ingredients 2 x 400g cans of sweetened condensed milk 180g unsalted butter, chopped 375g digestive biscuits, halved 60ml thickened cream Scraped seeds of 2 vanilla beans 75g icing sugar, sifted 4 bananas 30g dark chocolate, finely grated

Method Serves 12 Start this recipe a day ahead. Place the cans of condensed milk in a large saucepan of water and bring to the boil over a medium heat. Reduce heat to a simmer and cook for 2 hours adding water if necessary to ensure cans remain covered, remove cans and cool in the fridge for a couple of hours. Meanwhile melt butter in a small saucepan, and then cool slightly. Using a food processor crush biscuits to fine crumbs, add the butter and process briefly to combine. Press crumb mixture over the base of a greased 28cm loose based tin then refrigerate for 30 minutes to firm the base. Open cooled cans of condensed milk and spoon caramel evenly over the biscuit base and refrigerate overnight to firm. To assemble pie - using an electric mixer whisk cream, vanilla bean seeds and sugar to stiff peaks. Cut bananas into thin slices. Remove pie from tin and loosen base and place on a plate. Spoon or pipe half the whipped cream over the caramel filling, then place the bananas in an overlapping circle working from the outside in. Top with the remaining cream and sprinkle with grated chocolate. Cut into slices with a hot dry knife and serve immediately.

By: Café Sopra