Banana Crème Brûlée

Welcome to the second recipe, today we are going to tackle an English
dessert yes that's right an English dessert because Crème Brûlée was in fact
invented in Trinity College Cambridge not in France although its sounds much
nicer in French than "burnt cream". There are many versions and almost anything
can be used to flavour it providing it can be infused or blended into the cream.
Today I am going to give you a recipe for a banana version which I normally serve
with caramel ice cream although milk chocolate ice cream is very nice with it too.
The method is fairly simple but like so many things in pastry its lots of little things
done well.

The first thing to say is that we need to use very, very ripe bananas so ripe in fact
that you would not want to eat them, that is the way to get the real taste of banana
into the cream we are not using essence or flavouring just very ripe banana which
most people have knocking around especially in large busy kitchens where pastry
chefs tear their hair out thinking what to do with the pile of over-ripe bananas given
to them to use up. I do add a small amount of banana liqueur, I use Bols because
it has the best natural banana flavour.

A few things of note here before you start

Place water in the cooking tray to cook the creams slowly, if the dishes overheat
the cream will curdle. Cover the tray with foil this prevents that horrible skin on top
of the creams the small amount of steam created will prevent any skin forming at all.
Blow torch the creams briefly BEFORE you add any sugar this dries the top and
ensure the first dusting of sugar is not made into a syrup when caramelising the top.
If you take a long time to caramelise the tops trying to "dry out" this syrup you will
curdle the cream by using the torch too long. Always use icing sugar its fine so it
caramelises quickly and goes a beautiful golden colour do not use demerara it tastes
bitter if not caramelised correctly and because its so granular it takes too long to melt
and therefore tends to burn. Lastly do not mash, puree or chop the banana it will make
the creams discolour, you do not need to do this to get the flavour into the cream just
infuse it if you cut the banans in half and let them sit in the cream all the flavour goes
into the cream and it retains it lovely yellow custard colour.


Ok here we go

Banana Crème Brûlée 4 Portions
400g Double Cream
70g Egg Yolk (approximately 5 yolks)
75g Caster Sugar
3 very over-ripe bananas
10g Bols Banana Liqueur
Icing Sugar to caramelise

To serve
Ice cream, I like milk chocolate or salted caramel for this dish
Tuile biscuits and shortbread are also lovely too

Method
Pre-heat the oven to 120 degrees c.
Bring the cream up to the boil.
Add the peeled bananas cut in half (do not mash).
Cling film and leave to infuse for 30 minutes.
Pass the cream into a clean pan .
(do not push any banana through only the cream thats falls through the sieve).
Re-boil the cream.
Whisk the egg yolks and sugar together briefly.
Add a little of the boiled cream to the yolks/sugar and mix.
Add the remainder mix in well.
Place the custard into a clean pan.
Cook slowly until it coats the back of the spoon pass through a fine sieve.
Add the banana liqueur mix in.
Remove any bubbles from the top of the custard.
Place 4 dishes into a tray that fits into your oven.
Pour the custard evenly and carefully into the 4 dishes.
Slide the tray carefully into the lowest part of the oven.
Carefully pour boiled water into the tray 3/4 of the way up the dishes.
Carefully cover the tray with foil.
Cook gently for approximately 25-40 minutes (depends how deep the dishes are).
Check after 15 minutes make sure they do not cook too fast.
To check tap the dishes they should wobble like a jelly.
Remove when almost set they will carry on cooking in the dishes.
Be careful not to spill water onto the cooked creams.
Leave covered with the foil until cool.
Remove the creams from the cooking tray wipe dry.
Place into the fridge to chill for 30 minutes.
Blowtorch the creams to dry the top.
Lightly dust with icing sugar through a small sieve (a tea strainer is ideal).
Wipe excess icing sugar off the edge of the dish BEFORE you caramelise.
Caramelise with a blow torch.
Repeat until nicely caramelised (I normally do this 3 times).
Allow the top to set fully (3-4 minutes).
Serve with a ball or quenelle of ice cream on top and toasted crushed nuts (optional).
You may find it easier to scoop the ice cream before and place onto a chilled
tray and place back into the freezer to make serving easier.

Perfect for a dinner party as you can do all the prep before, the cream can be made
the day before and cling filmed just be careful not to damage the creams when cling filming.

Happy cooking
xxx