Like a cross between a banana cream pie and a candy bar, the beloved British dessert known as banoffee pie beckons with sweet, creamy decadence: A crisp pastry shell overflows with a gooey, butterscotch-y filling; fresh sliced bananas; and clouds of coffee-infused whipped cream.
The recipe originated in the 70s with Ian Dowding (author of Fish Bananas [2020]) and the late Nigel Mackenzie (who owned the now-shuttered Hungry Monk restaurant in Sussex, England). Dowding, the restaurant’s head chef, was eager to explain the pie’s provenance on a video call from his home in Sussex.
As Dowding tells it, the cream, toffee, and coffee combination was inspired by the Coffee Toffee Pie from Blum’s, a bakery in San Francisco. After coming up with a preliminary recipe that incorporated those flavors, the pair experimented with introducing various nuts and fruits. When they tried bananas, it was a light-bulb moment: “You just know [when it’s right],”
