Black Bottom Banoffee Pie

So where to begin about banoffee pie. . . Hmmm . . . The first time I ever even heard of such a dessert (a banana (“ban”) toffee (“offee”) pie) was either on an airplane reading this article in food and wine or surfing the web and seeing this on design sponge. I can’t recall which came first. But I do remember that the combo of bananas, whipped cream, and toffee/caramel sounded mind-blowing and that making such a sweet moved to the top of the to-do list.

It’s always a little liberating making a dessert you’ve never even tasted before, but also a bit daunting. To me, the combo of elements in a banoffee pie sounded too-good-to-be-true (I mean, why is this dessert not on every menu and in every bakery?), but I also couldn’t exactly imagine how all the flavors would balance each other out. What would happen to those bananas squashed between toffee and whipped cream? Would their flavor get lost? Would the chocolate cookie crust I envisioned overpower them?
Peeps, I am here to tell you, my fears were for naught. The black bottom banoffee pie surpassed even my wildest expectations. Moreover, I went deep-dish on this here bad-boy (ie: extra thick layers of each component) and still the bananas shined, the toffee was soft and chewy and uber caramel-y, the whipped cream its perfect foil, and enveloping the whole thing in a crust of chocolate cookies? Sheer brilliance.
So brilliant, in fact, that I have made this black bottom banoffee pie weekly since before Christmas (no, not for my family and friends, but because it is served nightly at Grindhaus, a restaurant in red hook Brooklyn). I also made it for a new year’s eve dinner party of 20 to much acclaim (and my book club loved it, and my 12 year-old’s sax teacher). Long story short, you can’t go wrong here. The recipe is super easy and, besides waiting for the toffee to firm up, super fast as well (we’re talking a no-bake crust here, folks). And did I mention that it’s awfully delicious and beautiful to look at (at least to me) and that everyone loves it? Thought so.
[yumprint-recipe id=’83’]