A Proper Banana Split
hit the sushi spot and ice cream spot… who's coming next time?
Bought, in the picture, from an ice cream counter. Easy enough to make at home and better, because the caramel will be warm and the cream will be real.
The one thing worth getting right is the whipped cream. That tall column that holds its shape is cream whipped to firm peaks with a little icing sugar, and it only happens if the cream, the bowl and the beaters are all properly cold. Warm cream whips to a loose foam that slumps in ninety seconds.
And the bananas go in along the sides, not underneath. Under the ice cream they are a cold slippery layer nobody wants; alongside, they are there in every spoonful.
- Feeds
- 2
- Hands-on
- 15 minutes
- Cream
- Everything cold
- Caramel
- Warm, not hot
What you need
The tray
- 6 scoops ice cream — vanilla, chocolate and strawberry if you are being traditional
- 2 bananas, halved lengthways then sliced
- 3/4 cup pecans, toasted and roughly chopped
- Maraschino cherries, stems on
The whipped cream
- 1 1/2 cups heavy cream, very cold
- 3 tbsp icing sugar
- 1 tsp vanilla
The caramel
- 3/4 cup sugar
- 3 tbsp butter
- 1/3 cup heavy cream, warmed
- A good pinch of flaky salt
How it goes
1 — Chill the bowl and the beaters in the freezer
Fifteen minutes. Cream whips by trapping air in fat, and warm fat will not hold it. This is why cream from a cold bowl doubles and cream from a warm one does not.
2 — Whip to firm peaks, then stop
Icing sugar and vanilla in, beaten until the cream holds a peak that stands up when the beater is lifted. Ten seconds past that and it goes grainy and then it is butter.
pro tip — Finish the last twenty seconds by hand with a whisk. It is almost impossible to overdo it that way and very easy with a machine.
3 — Dry caramel, swirled not stirred
Sugar alone in a dry pan over medium until it melts at the edges and goes amber. Swirl the pan; a spoon makes it crystallise into a lump.
4 — Butter, then WARM cream, off the heat
Pan off the flame, butter whisked in, then warm cream poured in slowly — it will erupt. Flaky salt at the end. Cold cream into hot caramel seizes it solid.
5 — Let the caramel cool to warm
Hot caramel on ice cream is a hole in the ice cream. Warm caramel pools at the corner of the tray, which is what the picture shows.
6 — Toast the pecans and let them cool
Dry pan, three minutes, shaken. Warm nuts melt everything they touch.
7 — Build it: ice cream, bananas at the sides, cream on top
Scoops in a line, banana slices tucked down both long sides, then the whipped cream piped or spooned into a tall column down the middle.
8 — Pecans, caramel at one corner, cherries last
Nuts scattered over, caramel poured at one end so it pools rather than covering everything, cherries on the cream. Eat it immediately.
Who's coming next time? LFG.