Banana & Brown Sugar Tart Tatin

Never have I talked so much about ice cream in the last few years. Jasper, my three year old pretends the stair gate is his shop. He pretends the tiny drawers next to the cooker hold his chocolate sprinkles and even toothbrushes are loaded with the good stuff. It’s terrible parenting but ice cream is his currency. Good behavior = ice cream. Bad behavior and mummy blocks the freezer door with a chair, her bottom or by whatever means possible.

We buy stacks of the stuff but often geared up to toddler taste buds (think fizzy bits and swirls) so imagine my delight when I was sent a new variety, a new Haagen Dazs flavour solely for grown up’s. Coffee Ice Cream. Let me say that again, Coffee Ice Cream. In other words crack cocaine to a Christian mum. No three year olds are allowed to touch it, no, not even one little “lip”.

I thought the ice cream was seriously good (you've got to be impressed when the ingredients read cream, milk, sugar, egg and coffee) but it still needed a partner to become a fitting, suitable dessert. With friends coming for dinner, I developed this recipe to be eaten when all children were safely asleep.

The French have a knack of creating tarts that set the benchmark for puddings and the classic tart tatin is no exception. I’ve used bananas as I sensed, once soft and gooey, they sit seamlessly with coffee. The pastry is crisp on the base but fudgey where needed and an unnecessarily large pile of nuts provides, well, a toasted crunch.  

With six ingredients, this is an effortlessly dreamboat pudding but one that is certainly only for grown ups.

Banana & Brown Sugar Tart Tatin

Serves 6

PREP TIME – 25 minutes

COOK TIME – 30 minutes

INGREDIENTS

500g Puff pastry

5 large banana’s, peeled and sliced in half

2 tbsp rum (optional)

50g unsalted butter

100g light brown soft sugar

50g macadamia nuts

DIRECTIONS

1. Preheat the oven to 220C/fan 200C/Gas 7.  Roll out the puff pastry on a lightly floured surface and cut out a 26cm circle. Place in the fridge and chill while you make the rest of the tart.

2. Melt the butter in a 24cm ovenproof frying pan, add the sugar and rum and melt over a medium/low heat. Shake the pan gently but do not stir and allow to bubble for a minute. Arrange the banana’s, cut side facing the bottom of the pan, on top of the caramel in a spiral pattern. Cover with the prepared pastry circle and tuck the edges inside the pan around the bananas.

3. Place in the preheated oven and bake for 30 minutes or until the pastry golden brown and puffed up.

4. Meanwhile, heat a dry frying pan over a medium heat,

5. Remove the tatin from the oven and leave to cool for 10 minutes before inverting a serving plate over the pan and flipping over as fast as your arms allow. Serve warm in slices with scoops of ice cream.

TIP – This is a great pudding if you wanted to do it in advance, make the whole lot – the caramel with bananas patiently sitting and the puff circle resting, tucked on top  - and leave aside. Just pop in the oven 40 minutes before you want to serve.