Juliet: Banoffee pie?
Mark: No, thanks.
Juliet: Thank God. You would’ve broken my heart if you’d said yes.
Mark: Oh, right. Well, lucky you.
The above is a classic scene from one of my all time favourite movies, Love Actually. Every single time the airport montage comes on with Hugh Grant’s beautiful voice-over… But to banoffee pie! Those who know me know that I actually don’t like cream – so I love banoffee pie, but only before it is really assembled. This is also the reason why I don’t have any photos of the finished product. For me, the important thing is the caramel (really I could take or leave the bananas, but that would kind of miss the point?). Nothing could be simpler, you just boil an unopened tin of condensed milk in a saucepan for several hours until it is an unctuous golden brown custardy caramel.
For the biscuit base:
8oz digestive biscuits (or you could use ginger nut, if you want to be really controversial)
5oz butter, melted.
3 Bananas
1 tin of Carnation condensed milk (not evaporated: it is not the same thing!)
Cream, for whipping.
Crush the biscuits in a food processor or with a rolling pin in a plastic bag (the biscuits that is!). Add the melted butter, and combine. Press well into a loose-bottomed flan tin and pop in the fridge to set.
For the caramel, put the tin in a saucepan with water about 2/3s of the side of the tin. Put it on a medium heat and leave for at least 3 hours, simmering away. When it is done, be really careful and leave it to cool a bit before you try and open it, or you risk spraying molten caramel everywhere.
Assemble just before serving, with a thick layer of caramel, sliced bananas and softly whipped cream. Enjoy!
