Banana Cream Pie

So, when I was in Maine last year, I tried banana cream pie for the first time at Thanksgiving. It is absolutely delicious. And I decided that I wanted to try making one. This week, while at my mother's, I finally got around to it. Basically because most of the ingrediants are things like flour and sugar and butter and milk. The sort of things that normal people have in the back of a cupboard, but I don't.

First of all I tried this recipe. Several things went wrong. The pie crust I brought from Sainsbury's got broken up on the way home, I forgot to buy vanilla but figured it wouldn't make much difference (I was wrong) and then there was the cooking. I stirred constantly, but I'm not used to stirring and didn't realise you needed to scrap the bottom of the pan. Seems like common sense now, but there you go. So the filling had burnt bits in it, and no vanilla. Then the recipe called
for baking it, and the bananas went all gross. It was digusting. The top of the filling congealed, but the rest of it was the same and still gross.

But, I REALLY liked that banana pie, and I wanted to try again. Today was take two. I used this recipe.

I remembered the vanilla this time, and even though I used caster sugar instead of granulated like the recipe called for, and only 3 eggs, because i didn't read it properly, this time I didn't let it burn, and it was delicious. Well, the filling was. I put it all together and it looks liked this...



Even before tasting it's a billion times better than attempt number one. Taste wise, it was yummy. A little strange though. I don't like cold custard, ever since a childhood incident, I've never been able to stomach it. I tend to avoid cold custard desserts, so I don't think Marnie's pie at Thanksgiving was a custardy one, but this pie I made is. I ate it, and it tasted nice, but it was very strange eating a custardy dessert after so many years of avoiding it. I'm gonna see if I can get a different recipe.

Meanwhile, here are the baking lessons I've learned:

1) scrap the bottom of the pan while stirring
2) vanilla may be small, but it's a very important ingredient
3) egg yolks are very hard to separate from egg whites
4) "stirring constantly" means stirring constantly - get all the ingredients ready BEFORE you start
5) wait for the filling to cool before you add the cream to the top,
or the cream will melt ten seconds after you take the photograph

I want to try more baking. I have plenty of recipe books at home. Maybe it's time I got that flour and sugar and stuff that everyone has in their cupboards.