Banana Cream Pie
10th Feb 2012
So, do you like the new look of the website? I was very worried this morning when I started playing around with the different preset designs, those of you that follow me on twitter will know that I thought I'd broken it forever! But alas no, I found a nice pretty design that works for me, and even better the menu is down the left hand side now. I think I rather like it.
It's an inset day at school today so I currently have children running in and out of the kitchen. Right this minute I have a very small boy playing peek-a-boo with me on the chair beside me. Sophie is pretending to do work on her own laptop, she's actually colouring butterflies on the CBeebies website, but she thinks she's copying Mummy. Rio meanwhile is enjoying some Art Attack on tv. I haven't heard a peep out of him so far. He ate his breakfast, all of it! This is unusual for him.
I got this fantastic recipe from a book my mum bought me for Christmas, it's called "Grandma's Best Recipes".
It's amazing and I highly recommend it. Now I will warn you that there is no gourmet meals in there, it's full of good old fashioned comfort foods. Foods that remind you of your childhood. That book makes me hungry just thinking about it. It's one of those that makes me want to go and try every single recipe all in one day!
That's the book you see propped up in the picture.
The banana cream pie itself was made as a cheer-me-up pudding for my niece, the same niece that's more like my sister. She's banana crazy so I thought this would be spot on. It seemed to go down well too.
What you'll need:
Ingredients:
- flour for dusting - 350g shortcrust pastry (pre-packed is fine trust me but you can make your own if you wish. If using frozen make sure pastry is fully thawed) - 4 large egg yolks - 85g caster sugar - 4tbsp cornflour - pinch salt - 450ml milk - 1tsp vanilla extract - 3 bananas (you can judge this youself depending on their size though) - half tsp lemon juice - 350ml/1 carton double cream, whipped with 3tbsp icing sugar. This is your topping. |
Equipment:
- 23cm pie/flan dish . I bought mine from Asda for just £3 it was 26cm however. - fork - rolling pin - baking beans (or dry pasta) - balloon whisk - mixing bowl - saucepan - scales - measuring spoons |
Right, here's what you do...
1)Preheat your oven to 200C/400F/Gas 6
Very lightly flour a rolling pin and work surface. Roll out your pastry into a 30cm round, not too thinly but not too thick. Maybe the thickness of 2 stacked pound coins. Once rolled out, drape it on your rolling pin and line your pie dish. Don't forget there needs to be a lip of pastry around the edge of the dish as the pastry will shrink. Prick the base all over with a fork and line with baking paper. If you have baking beans then that's great, place them on top of the baking paper. If you're like me and you don't have any you can use dry pasta, I found fusilli worked a treat. You won't be able to use this pasta afterwards...
2) Bake in your preheated oven for about 15 minutes or until the pastry is pale gold in colour. Remove the beans (or whatever you used) and the baking paper. You should notice the base of the pastry is still wet at this stage. Return the pie to the oven for a further 5-10 minutes until golden and dry. Leave to cook completely on a wire rack.
3) While the pastry is cooling place your egg yolks in a bowl with the sugar, cornflour and sakt. Beat with your whisk until blended and pale in colour. Whisk in the milk and vanilla extract.
4) To make your custard pour the mixture into your saucepan over a med-high heat and bring to the boil. Stir continuously until the mixture is smooth and thick. For a good long while my mixture didn't look like it was going to thicken at all and then all of a sudden, whoosh! It thickened just lovely.
Once it has thickened reduce to a low heat and simmer for about 2 minutes. Press the custard through a sieve into a bowl and set aside to cool. This take about an hour as you can't put it in the fridge.
5) Once the custard has cooled it's time to slice your bananas. I know I said 3 but it really depends how banana-y you want your pie. You need enough to cover the base of the pastry, more if really love bananas. Before you put them on your pastry you need to swill them around a bowl with the lemon juice for a minute. Once this is done you can spread the slices out over the nicely cooled pastry in a nice even layer. Top the bananas with the cooled custard and again, spread out evenly. Now this pie needs to go in the fridge for 1-2 hours to firm up a bit.
7) FINAL STEP...I bet you're glad aren't you?
The only thing left to do is whip up your double cream, don't forget to add the icing sugar. As soon as it's thickly whipped you can use a spatula or a spoon to distribute over the custard layer. If you want you can sprinkle some hundreds and thousands all over it, or chocolate chips, or crushed flake. Or you could just eat it?
Thank you so much for reading today, do try this recipe - it's super lovely!
Lots of love
K xxx