Mr Farty's World-Famous Banoffee Pie Recipe - Illustrated

I get more hits on this blog for my Banoffee Pie recipe than anything else, so it's only fair that I should update it with step-by-step photos and that.

This is absolutely the bestest thing to eat in the world.

Your taste buds will love you forever.

Your arteries...well, you only live once.

Enjoy!

Ingredients:

1 tin sweetened condensed milk. Not pre-cooked caramel, it's too runny.
12-15 digestive biscuits, McVities if you can get them.
3 oz. butter. Not margarine, not "I can't believe...", not "Spreadable", but BUTTER.
½ tsp freshly ground ginger (optional).
1 pint (600ml) whipping cream aka double cream. Not that low-fat crap either.
3 large green bananas. More if they're smaller.
1-2 Cadbury's Flakes.
1 fresh (cough) lemon.
1 large dash of Amarula (optional).


Method:
Crush the biscuits into a large bowl, not forgetting to add the ginger. Like I did.


Nuke the butter for 10 seconds on full power.




Make a well in the crushed biscuits and pour in the melted butter


and a measure of Amarula


and mix thoroughly.

Spread over the base of a flan dish, tamp down flat
and pop into the freezer.





Set the TARDIS controls for yesterday. Put the unopened tin/s in a deep pan and cover with water. ¹


Bring to the boil, turn down the heat and simmer for 4 hours, topping up regularly. Return to the present day.



Only when it has cooled enough to pick up barehanded, open the tin of what-has-now-magically-become-toffee and spread over the biscuit base before returning it to the freezer.




Slice the bananas into a bowl with some freshly squeezed
lemon juice, then arrange over the base in layers.
Put 6-7 slices in a separate bowl for decoration.

Rather than washing out the bowl, pour the excess lemon juice into a glass, then hand-whisk the cream until it forms soft peaks. Gently fold in the remaining lemon juice to thicken the mixture.


Smother the bananas in cream.


Smooth over with a palette knife or back of a spoon.


Decorate with the remaining slices of banana and crumble the Flake/s over the top, being careful not to obscure the banana with the crumbled...meh.

Et Violá!


Serves 8-12. Or two teenagers.






Notes:
Preparation time about an hour plus four hours keeping half an eye on the cooking tins.
Wash your hands, a lot, unless you like sticky cameras.
Use the base of a glass tumbler to crush the Flake/s before unwrapping.
Use a glass flan dish, otherwise you might score it getting the slices out.
If you insist on opening the tin while it is still piping hot, don't come running to me when it sprays hot toffee in your face. You have been warned.
I like to cook 2-3 tins of toffee at once. Write "TOFFEE" on the tops of all cooked tins before returning them to the cupboard, so you don't cook them again.
If you prepare the base overnight, allow 30 mins after adding the topping to allow the base to thaw before serving.
Can be frozen, but I wouldn't.
I was going to calculate the calories but then I realised if you were worried about your weight, you wouldn't be here.
If you're wondering "banoffee pie is it ok to cook condensed milk overnight?" No. Just no.
¹ WARNING WARNING WARNING
The makers say you should never boil an unopened can as it might explode. Here is the correct way:
How to caramelize condensed milk.

Decisions, decisions...

I must have done something right, as I've been awarded a Red Letter Day by TPTB. There is so much to choose from, I am at a loss what to pick.

That's where you come in. Which of these wonderful experiences do you think I would appreciate the most?

1. 30 minute Light Aircraft Flight. It's not as if I get vertigo on a stepladder. No, wait.
   
2. Deluxe Ginger Chocolate Selection.
   
3. Intermediate Golf Masterclass with a Pro. That sounds a bit of alright. Oh, pro golfer. Boo!
   
4. Farting. Oops, my mistake. Karting.
   
5. Pamper Spa Day. Nothing like a good pamp in the spa.
   
6. Topshop VIP Experience. With a personal shopper and that.
   
7. All Bar None Chocolate Selection.
   
8. White Water Rafting for Two. Oh, yes, Mrs F would just love that. If she could swim.
   
9. Aerotow Gliding Flight. Ooo, flying with no propellor, fab!
   
10. Bird of Prey Day. Now I would love to fly a Romulan Bird of Prey!
    
11. Sumptuous Chocolate Truffle Selection.
    
12. Overnight Ghost Hunt. Cos what's the point of daylight ghost hunting?
    
13. Skidpan Driving. Sounds vaguely toilet related. Ah, but you need a valid driving licence.
    
14. Luxurious Milk Chocolate Selection.
    
15. Extended Microlighting. I could wear a nappy, I suppose.
    
16. Adopt An Olive Tree. FFS.
    
17. Superior Fruit Chocolate Selection.
    
18. Bouquet of Stargazer Lilies. I'm in touch with my feminine side already, ta.
    
19. Dom Perignon Gift Box.
    
20. Falconry Day. I could train it to hunt grey squirrels, cool!
    
21. Gourmet Experience Voucher.
    
22. High-Speed Passenger Ride for Two. And that differs from joyriding in Wester Hailes how, exactly?
    
23. Ice Climbing for Two. Totally appropriate for anyone with arthritis.
    
24. Krug Champagne Gift Box. Don't like champagne.
    
25. 24cm Cast Iron Round Casserole Dish. Wow!
    
26. Mountain Climbing. Meh.
    
27. Paintball for Three. Me, Mrs F and Mrs Dull. Two paintball guns.
    
28. Rapid Running for Two. As against Slow Running?
    
29. Rich Dark Chocolate Selection.
    
30. Rock and Ice Climbing for Two. Whoopee.Frickin.Doo.
    
31. Chocolate Club (8 months)
    
32. Sony Walkman 8GB MP3 and Video Player.
    
33. Stokesley Hamper. Nom. Nom. And indeed, nom.
    
34. Supreme Chocolate Box.
    

Five Things

This meme came from Misssy over at The Misssy M Misssives. Looks like a lot more than five to me, but I never was too good at sums and that, so here goes...

What were you doing ten years ago?

1. 1997 was the first time, except for a very brief trip to Glenshee, that I went skiing on proper snow. There was a works outing to Andorra, so I took Little Miss Farty along for the ride. It's the first - and last - time I skiied on a black run. I know it was 1997, cos I saw observed comet Hale-Bopp at its closest approach from the top of the Pyrenees. With binoculars wot my bruvva had gave me.



2. I met the girl who broke my heart for the very.last.time. She was up in Scotchland to pick up a fridge, as you do, and stopped off in Embra for a visit. We just sat and chatted, in a bar, for an hour, about nothing in particular, but by the time she left, the empty place inside of me, which had been aching for ever so long, had been healed. Which was nice.



3. I discovered the Slippery Nipple, which despite what it says in the Urban Dictionary is Baileys and Sambuca, in the same glass but not mixed.


4. I learned something about flash photography. Take a glass of Sambuca, set light to it, then dip your middle finger in the glass and hold your flaming finger up while someone photographs it. Try it, that's all I'm saying.



5. And didn't Princess What's-her-face decide to drop out of public view that year? Mrs Farty and I left flowers at the Scotch Monument, since everybody else was doing it. And had a wee greet. Shut up.

What were you doing one year ago?

1. Working my butt off on a certain merger. 12-hour shifts, sometimes 7 days a week, hence not much else.



2. I got sick with that winter vomiting bug, probly related to the above, and took a week off work. I would have been climbing the walls with boredom, except that...



3. I found that my new works laptop had full internet access.



4. So I spent my time off work reading Non-Working Monkey's blog from Day One to present day. Is that what they call cyber-stalking?



5. But back in January, I spent the New Year drinking Amarula beside the braai while the kids splashed in the outdoor swimming pool. Guess where? Not Embra, oddly enough.

Five Songs you know the lyrics to:

Oh, now that's hard, I just like to hum along...

1. American Pie by Don McLean. My sister-in-law brought the album (vinyl!!!) back from the USA for me in, feck, a while ago. 1974?



2. Leaving On A Jet Plane by Peter, Paul and Mary. Long before I ever heard of John Denver.



3. Even In The Quietest Moments by Supertramp. (You might want to fast-forward the first couple of minutes.) A good friend of mine was in a band that played a superb instrumental version of this, but they had trouble memorising the lyrics. So I bought it, learned it and, er, oh yes, I forgot that I can't sing. Bummer.



4. Mr Blue Sky by ELO. Trivia note - the girl with the magic smile in this video is the late, great Rosie Vela.



5. Hollaback Girl by Gwen Stefani. What? A bloke can't be hep with the modern groove? Man.

Five things you would do if you were a millionaire:

1. Give a big chunk to Greenpeace.



2. Emigrate. Abroad, probly. Somewhere warm. Like. You know. SA or NZ.



3. But not before buying a walk-on part in Doctor Who. How cool would that be? Way cool.



4. Take up blogging full time.



5. You think I'm kidding with 4. I'm not.

Five bad habits:

Only five?

1. Picking my nose. I love a good root around. Surely it's no coincidence that the human nostril is exactly the same size as the Pinky?



2. Snoring, apparently. Mrs Farty accuses me of it, but I've stayed awake all night to check and never once heard myself snore.



3. Hitting the snooze button too many times, then being in a mad dash to get up for work.



4. Speaking before I think.



5. Spending way too much time busy blogging.

Five things you like to do:

1. Blogging. Well, that's a given, innit?



2. Playing Go.



3. Reading Science Fiction. The Good Stuff, like this.



4. Take nice photographs. Not many people know this, but I now have a Flikr(sp?) account. I promise I'll put some more pix up real soon now.



5. Make banoffee pie. Gosh, I haven't done that since, erm, Sunday.

Five things you will never wear again:

1. My cowboy boots. I bought them on my first trip to Merka. Oh yeah, I visit Merka all the time. Four times in fifty years, if you count that weekend in June. Anyway, they were too tight on my poor toes even then. But I do still sometimes wear the cowboy hat (when I think nobody's looking). Gen. You. Wine. Leather.



2. Old Spice. wtf was I thinking?



3. Ribbons in my hair. *sob*



4. A bungee harness. It's like this. One year, Mrs Farty and I went to Blackpool with her siblings, spouses (spice?) and that. We went on nearly every ride. We nearly went on the dodgems (bumper cars); we nearly went on the water slide; we nearly went on the roller-coaster; we never actually went on anything. Everyone was like, "oh, yes, I'll go on if you do". Yeah, right. So the next time we went, I decided to have a go anyway. Not one of those scaredy-cats would go on with me, so it was just me. I went on the Slingshot ride. Gosh, it was such fun! I had to go on the Pepsi Max Rollercoaster just to calm my nerves afterwards.



5. Any kind of leather jacket. No reason, I just don't like them very much.

Five favourite toys:

1. My wee moby.



2. My hand blender. See banoffee pie. Whipped cream in 30 seconds flat.



3. Wumpy, my toy rabbit from when I was, like, wee. Long since disintegrated, but I still remember when he had two eyes. And one ear. And a tail.



4. My Sonic Screwdriver. Really.



5. My blog. Does that count? I play with it enough.

Five things you hate to do:

1. Stop to change batteries. I was thinking of my camera, but you can read what you like into this one, eh girls?



2. Say goodbye to friends.



3. Get up on cold, dark mornings. Boo!



4. Work night shift. Thought I'd gotten away from that one 16 years ago, but I still get roped into it now and then.



5. Diet? Exercise? Hmmm...I'll go for a long walk quite happily. Diet, then. I couldn't forego chocolate.

I'm not tagging anyone in particular, but if you do decide to pick this one up, drop me a line. Ta.

And The Winner Is...

Having thought long and hard over some very witty entries (i.e. all of them) whilst scoffing some apple crumble (life isn't all about Banoffee Pie), I the judges have come to a decision.

The results of the Caption Competition, in reverse order, are as follows:


In third place, receiving an honorable mention for "And this little beauty was owned by a little old lady who only used it to drive back and forth across the Cannon Firing Tournament grounds.", is Mr Diesel of Merka.

In second place, winning a crisp new five-pound coupon redeemable for choclit and that for "Oneupmanship at the bowling club had gone just a little too far this time...", my goodness, it's Mr. X of Down South!!

Drum roll...

And the winner of two five-pound Thornton's vouchers for her entry "Susan didn't know quite what to expect when she ticked the box marked Thunderball on her lottery ticket..." is our very own Ms Cat of The Cathouse!! Yayyy!!


Can the winner and runner-up please indicate a suitable box number or similar snail-mail receptacle for their prizes via email to MrFarty@BlueYonder.co.uk - thank you and goodnight!


What? Oh, FFS! Very well...

In third place, receiving an honorable mention for "And this little beauty was owned by a little old lady who only used it to drive back and forth across the Cannon Firing Tournament grounds.", is Mr Diesel of Merka.

In second place, winning a crisp new five-pound coupon redeemable for choclit and that for "Oneupmanship at the bowling club had gone just a little too far this time...", my goodness, it's Mr. X of Down South!!

Drum roll...

And the winner of two five-pound Thornton's vouchers for her entry "Susan didn't know quite what to expect when she ticked the box marked Thunderball on her lottery ticket..." is our very own Ms Cat of The Cathouse!! Yayyy!!

The Lines Are Closed...

The votes will be counted and verified on Sunday. Or Monday. Tuesday at the latest.

I must say that I'm very impressed with both the quantity and quality of the entries in the Caption Competition. I may have to call in an independent adjudicator on account of I might be biased/too lazy to think of a prize for a foreigner.

And I'd forgotten that some ex-pats live in Brussels. What does it say about Belgian chocolate that Brussels bloggers are vying for Thornton's vouchers?

Good news - I resisted the urge to pop into said shop today. Instead, I stood outside and counted bits of paper. Three. At a fiver a pop. Meaning I've got fifteen pounds worth of vouchers, not just ten, so there will be a prize for the runner-up. Hurrah!

Talk amongst yourselves while I decide...decisions, decisions...

Competition Time!

Or "I Can't Think Of A Funny Caption"

This picture is begging, BEGGING I tells ya, for a funny caption.

Ten British Pounds worth of Thornton's vouchers for the best one submitted by, say, 14th July 2007. If, by a fluke, some Johnny Foreigner comes up with something more amusing than a Brit, I'll have to think of something. Maybe a competition to decide on a prize...no, wait...

Update

Competition closes in 3 hours or thereabouts. Many thanks to Goth for getting the ball rolling. My own best effort (after checking the original story) was "Library gets serious about overdue books".

Nuvver Update

Competition has now closed. Ner ner ne ner ner.

Winners posted here.

Adventures in the Canada - Last Day

Having admired the hummingbirds feeding out on Vancouver Island, we got back to P's place, where I spotted - and this time recognised - her own empty feeder. "Oh, I've never filled it," she explained, "I just bought it as an ornament." Thinks: If you fill it, they will come. So I did. And on the afternoon of the final day, as I was sitting right beside the thing, I heard the now-familiar VVVVVvvvvvvvvt sound announcing the approach of a feathered friend. Remember the stories about fairies at the bottom of the garden? I could have reached out and touched the little feller, it was pure, heart-stopping magic.

There was more, but I'm tired and frankly, by comparison to the above, meh. In summary,
Took the SkyTrain to Metrotown Mall - 450 shops but no Loius Vuitton handbag for LMF. Txt prompt - Armani will do. Aye right. We did meet a bloke with an LV man-bag, a scrap of cloth priced at $1000.
Saw a train in the mall. With passengers.
Death by Chocolate. What a way to go.
Caught the plane home at 6pm Friday, flew all night except that there was no night, the sun barely grazed the northern horizon as we crossed Greenland and then inexorably rose back towards the zenith.
Unpacked the dress shoes, socks and trousers that Mrs Farty packs for every holiday and never, ever get used.
Checked the immaculately-mown lawn - at least no prospective burglar would have noticed that we'd been away.


Oh. I've uploaded some holiday snaps, but you don't want to see those, eh?

Adventures In The Canada Part 3

In Which Events Take an Unexpected Turn

It appears that fucktards are to be found the world over, as we discovered when our host threw us out of his flat. I'm not sure whether it was because we didn't want to go to the hockey game with him, leaving him out of pocket by fifty bucks per head, or because Mrs Farty told him to ditch his crack-whore good-for-nothing thieving girlfriend before she sold off everything he had for drugs. Anyway, we moved in with his pot-smoking daughter and her trailer-trash husband, who made us feel somewhat more welcome by giving up their bed for us. And driving us up to Whistler.

Whistler is a beautiful piece of unspoilt Canadian outback. Or was, until the ski resort was built. And they won their bid to host the 2010 Winter Olympics. Now it's more of a tourist trap. Still, they had nice chocolate-coated strawberries (at two dollars ninety-nine each, how many do you think we bought?), toffee apples and a great big (stuffed toy) grizzly bear. We stopped off on the way back down to take in the Brandywine Falls - simply breathtaking - then detoured through Stanley Park to see the black skwerls.

Still loving the Canada...