Tag Archives: biscuit

Spicy Cheese Crackers

27 Dec

I really dont like the crackers that you can get at the stores. They taste like they are full of chemicals. And when the process of making crackers is so very simple, its a wonder that we buy them at all. This past Christmas, I was going to dinner at Jobby’s house. I wanted to bring some lovely but simple things, as I had been immersed in cooking these last few days. I decided on a raspberry-gooseberry fool, which is just whipped cream, scented with vanilla and a touch of icing sugar, folded into cooled stewed raspberries and gooseberries. That sweet tart cool creamy combination is beautiful – and it takes minutes to make.

I knew Jobby would probably make her wonderful hummus. So crackers were a good addition – and they are delicious enough to eat on their own. Unfortunately I did not get a photograph because Nana chowed down more than half before we even left the house! But suffice to say, these crackers are wonderful – such a complex blend of flavour. You could spice them up with anything you like, but I used chili powder, mustard seeds, and English mustard powder. The combination is divine, spicy and cheese-y all at the same time. The crackers are crisp and flaky and can be cut into rounds, squares, or whatever your heart desires. Poke a few holes in them, pop them in a hot oven, and watch them brown up and puff a little. Beautiful.

These crackers will keep, in an air tight box, for about a week, but if you have a Nana around the house they wont last!

Makes about 100 crackers, depending on how you cut them

  • 1 cup bread flour (OO flour)
  • 1 cup polenta
  • 1 tsp salt
  • 1 tsp baking soda
  • 1 tsp chili powder
  • 2 tsp mustard seeds
  • 1 1/2 tsp English mustard powder
  • 1 cup cheese – cheddar/parmesan mix
  • 3 tbsp cold butter
  • 1 cup buttermilk

Preheat the oven to 190 C (375F).

Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.

In a large bowl, combine the flour, polenta, salt, baking soda, chili powder, mustard seeds and English mustard powder. Toss to combine.

Grate the cheese over the flour mixture, and stir well.

Grate over the cold butter, and stir again, gently.

Pour over the buttermilk, and combine. Turn the dough out onto a working surface and knead, gently until it all comes together.

Form the dough into a ball, and refrigerate, covered for about half an hour.

Once the dough has rested and cooled, divide it into quarters.

You can now roll the dough out very thin, and cut it into shapes, or roll the dough into a log, and slice very thinly.

Arrange on the baking sheet, and using the tines of a fork, poke a few holes in each cracker. This is optional, but it will help keep the crackers flat and less puffy.

Bake for about 8 – 10 minutes, or until the crackers are golden and cheesy.

Let cool for at least 10 minutes before gobbling up!

 

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Cheese Scones / Biscuits

16 Nov

Yummy!Oh my goodness gracious. These are so good. So very very good. Fluffy, rich, creamy, cheesy, light and gorgeously tender. Cheddar cheese scones (or biscuits as Americans would call them) are a quick bread – about half an hour from inception to eating. They dont require any special equipment, in fact I prefer to grate the butter and cheddar directly into the flour and mix with the fingers. You need to be quick in order to keep these scones light as air – and there is a little trick. Add the baking powder after you combine the flour, salt, cheese and butter. This will make sure that the leavening agent is given the best possible chance to make the scones really fluffy.

I have always been fascinated by scones and biscuits. They taste so good, and look like they are easy to make… But they are not! It was a long time before I really began to understand the mechanics of how to make these perfectly. If you take your time, let the butter melt, or work the dough too hard, the scones can be thick and lumpy, with little rise. But if you have everything at the ready, dont forget to sift the dry ingredients, and use your fingertips (and cold butter, cheese and cream), then these scones really are quick and incredibly easy.

These are deeply cheesy – and they really reflect the cheese you choose, so choose well – organic aged cheddar is best. These will be a wonderful addition to a party or celebration dinner. They can be cut in any shape or size, though I prefer smaller 1 1/2 inch circles. They are wonderful split and  layered with cheese and tomato jam – or just as they are, especially just baked. They taste pretty phenomenal with a smear of strawberry jam too! Breakfast, lunch or dinner, these scones are deeply satisfying and totally delectable.

Please do note that these are rich and stuffed with butter, cheese and cream. Theyre no diet food, but then I wouldnt eat them every day. They are the ultimate comfort food though. Eating one of these scones, hot from the oven is pure, perfect joy.

By the way, they keep for about 3 days, tightly covered, and reheat well either in a low oven or in the toaster. Though I truly doubt that there will be any left though once your loved ones catch a scent of baking bread and cheese… 🙂

Makes about 18 1-1/2 inch scones

  • 3 – 3 1/2 cups all purpose flour
  • 1/2 tsp salt
  • 6 tbsp (3/4 stick/3 oz) butter, grated
  • 2 cups of good cheddar, grated
  • 5 tsp baking powder
  • Fresh cracked black pepper (optional)
  • 300 ml (about 1 1/4 cup / 10 fl oz) cream/sour cream/milk (I put 2 tbsp sour cream in a measuring cup and then half and half cream and milk)
  • A few tablespoons of milk to glaze (optional)

Preheat your oven to 215C (425F), and line a baking sheet with parchment paper.

Sift together about 3 cups of flour and the salt into a large mixing bowl. Keep the addition flour aside in case you need it to pull the scones together.

Using the largest holes on your grater, grate 3/4 stick of butter directly onto the flour. Using your fingertips, quickly toss the butter into the flour.

Grate 2 cups of cheddar and add it to the butter/flour mixture. Using your fingertips, mix well again. You should have a floury, pebbly, mealy mixture.

Measure out the baking powder, and sift onto the dough mixture. Toss with your fingertips again to combine well. Crack some black pepper into the mixture if you like (I do), and toss again.

Measure out your cream/milk/sour cream mixture. The more cream you add to the mix, the richer the scones will be. I use about 2 tbsp of sour cream, and then make up to about 6 fluid oz with cream, and add milk for the rest. Whisk together with a fork – the mixture will be lumpy from the sour cream, but this is fine.

Pour your cream/milk mixture directly over the flour, and using your hands, knead the milk into the flour until a dough comes together. If its really wet, add a little more flour, a tablespoon at a time. You want a thick soft pliable dough that holds together, and yet feels very tender and delicate. This should take only a few kneads – treat the dough very gently and carefully because you want it to be as light as possible.

Turn the dough out onto a firm working surface and pat into a rectangle or square about 1 1/2 inches thick. Use a round or cookie cutter to cut scones directly out of the rectangle, and move directly onto the baking sheet.

Any left over scraps can be quickly patted together again and recut, but know that if you do this more than once, those scones will be flatter than the others!

Let rest for about 3 – 5 minutes, and glaze with milk if you like (or even 1 egg whisked). This just encourages the top to brown well, but you dont need to do it if you dont want to!

Bake in the oven for 10 – 15 minutes or until light, fluffy and well browned at the top. Dont over bake – they will continue to firm up once out of the oven. Let cool for 5 minutes or so on the baking sheet (though I usually cant resist trying at least one!) and serve immediately, or store tightly covered for 3 days.

 

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Pretty Gingersnap Cookies

14 Nov

Gingersnaps!Today was a day of birthdays! My beloved nephew turned 21 (yeah, I cant quite believe it myself!) and dear friends celebrated their, and their children’s, birthdays with a huge bash this afternoon. I wanted to contribute something, and so I made cookies! About 200 Starry Starry Night Cookies (4 batches) and about 200 of these gorgeous decorated gingersnap cookies. I was going to make sugar cookies, as I did for my sayang niece’s 1st birthday, but I thought I would try something different – and I do love a good, crisp ginger cookie. These make fantastic gingerbread people, and they last for ages (no eggs, so they dont go soft quickly) – you could poke hole in them (with a straw or chopstick) and use them as stunningly pretty decorations on a tree for Christmas.

I used Royal Icing for the cookies, and it set hard, and gorgeous. And because it was a children’s party, I used IndiaTree natural food colours – they were the loveliest shades of pastel – pink, robin’s egg blue, violet and spring green. Before the icing set, I decorated them with tiny silver and gold dragees, hearts, sparkle sugar, and colourful hard sugar confetti. They looked luscious, and they tasted pretty great too!

The other thing I loved about these cookies were they were a snap (hehe) to make – but you need to be really organised and focused. I made 2 batches of dough, each divided into 4. Rolled out, and frozen overnight, and then cut with small and large shapes. I stuck with hearts and circles, but you could make animals, letters, stars… anything actually that you can find as a cookie cutter. They take about 10 – 15 minutes to bake. Decorating can take a bit longer!

If you prefer chewy cookies, roll out a bit thicker, and cut and bake until the centres are just firm. Either way, involve the young people in your life in the decoration. You will be overjoyed by their creativity, and your cookies will be uniquely beautiful.

Makes about 20 – 25 gingerbread people or 80 – 100 gingersnap cookies (depending on the size of your cookie cutter). Any leftover can be frozen, rolled out, for later use.

  • 3 cups all purpose flour
  • 3/4 cup dark brown sugar (use dark brown, not light brown – you will taste the difference here. The dark brown sugar really deepens the flavour of the cookie)
  • 1 tbsp cinnamon
  • 1 tbsp ginger
  • 1/2 tsp all spice or mixed spice
  • 1/2 tsp nutmeg
  • 1/2 tsp cloves
  • 1/2 tsp salt
  • 3/4 tsp baking soda
  • 1 1/2 sticks (3/4 cup – 12 tbsp) butter
  • 3/4 cup molasses
  • 2 tbsp milk

In a large stand mixer, or large bowl if youre using a handheld mixer, combine the flour, sugar, cinnamon, ginger, all spice, nutmeg, cloves, salt and baking soda. Mix briefly so all are combined well.

Add the butter, cut into large chunks, and mix again. The butter will “cut” into the flour mixture, and will become coated with it – and the bowl will look like it contains a sandy mixture of small dark pellets.

Add the molasses and mix again. The dough will start coming together with the addition of the molasses.

I usually add the milk to the measuring cup which held the molasses, and stir it around a bit to capture any molasses that was left behind. Add the milk, and mix just briefly.

You will have a very very soft dough. Turn out onto a sheet of wax paper, and divide into four even pieces. Working quickly, form a disc with each piece, wrap tightly in individual pieces of wax paper, and transfer to the fridge to firm up for about 30 minutes or so.

Once the dough has firmed (it will still be pliable, but will just be a little easier to work with), place a piece of wax paper on your working surface, then a disc of dough, and cover with a second piece of wax paper. Roll out quite thinly and evenly. You now need to freeze the dough for about half an hour (and even overnight if you wish) – you could also refrigerate it, but I find it works quite well coming out of the freezer. Given that this is the tropics, frozen dough is much easier to work with.

Once you have frozen or refrigerated the dough, and are ready to bake, prepare your oven. Preheat to 160C (325F).

Remove one sheet of dough from the freezer. Peel the top layer of wax paper off the dough, and then replace it onto the dough sheet (this helps in making the dough easy to remove once its been cut). Flip the sheet over, and remove the (now) top layer of wax paper. I used this wax paper to line my baking sheets.

Cut out shapes and patterns to your heart’s content, and place on a baking sheet lined with wax paper.

Bake in the hot oven for about 10 – 15 minutes, or until the cookies have puffed (from the baking soda), and deflated, have darkened just a bit, and are firm in the centre to your touch.

Remove and allow cookies to cool for about 5 minutes on the baking sheet, and then transfer to a rack (or even a plate – they should be pretty cool and hardy by now). Repeat with the remaining dough.

Decorate as you like, or have them perfectly naked – a spicy wonderful happy making gingersnap.

Any scraps can be gathered together, formed into a disc, refrigerated, rolled out, frozen and re-cut.

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Royal Icing

14 Nov

cookieOh Royal Icing, how do I love thee? This stuff is absolutely fantastic for cookies – it sets hard, and any colour you add to it becomes almost jewel like. When its still wet, you can decorate it with sparkles or sugar or dragees or any other edible lovely you can think of. Its also good as a glaze for a pound cake or a bundt cake – it goes on slick and if its quite liquid, it adds just a thin glaze, that will thicken and harden and protect your cake from drying out. You can flavour it (my preference is vanilla, but go crazy – chocolate, almond, lemon, whatever your passion), and its quick and easy to make… IF you have the correct tools.

I only make royal icing with meringue powder. Its traditionally made with egg whites, but even when using organic eggs, I am never quite happy serving raw egg to children, people with compromised immune systems or pregnant women. The risk of salmonella is just too high. Meringue powder is basically egg whites that have been pasturised and freeze dried, mixed with small amounts of sugar, edible gums, alum, salt, vanillin and calcium lactate. It can be used in just about any recipe that calls for egg white, but to be honest, in most recipes fresh egg white tastes better! But in royal icing, I believe it is essential, and I love love love it! You can find it in speciality baking shops, or online, and I always try and have a jar of it around. Baking is just that much easier with it.

That said, you need to be super organised, otherwise the icing will definitely get the best of you. It hardens pretty quickly, so make sure that you work with only what you need at any given time, and cover the rest (or store in an airtight container). This recipe will give you about 3 cups of royal icing – more than enough to ice about 100 – 150 small cookies. I would highly recommend the use of IndiaTree natural food colouring to tint the icing, and a palette knife to spread the icing on the cookie. If you have them, pastry bags, fitted with small-ish tips are incredibly useful for applying the icing to the cookie surface (and if you want to get really fancy, try using tiny tips and decorating the icing with a contrasting colour!).

Gingersnaps!Have a large work surface, arrange all your cookies on a flat sheet, and work about 10 cookies at a time – icing, and then decorating if you wish with hearts, sparkles, etc. Let the cookies air dry for at least 2 hours before packing away. I divided my icing up into 4 equal portions, placed it in plastic take away containers with lids, and dyed it blue, purple, green and pink. I then covered what I didnt need, and placed what I would use in a pastry bag. I clipped the bags top and bottom, to ensure the icing stayed a good creamy consistency as I worked. When I moved on to the next colour, I whisked the icing before I used it to make sure it was creamy and smooth.

Its all a bit complex, but you will soon find your own rhythm and natural feel for it. Practice – even on strips of wax paper, and see how it spreads, how it comes out of the pastry bag, how it moves about when smoothed with a palette knife. Once you play with royal icing, you will look for reasons to play once more!

Makes about 3 cups

  • 1/4 cup meringue powder
  • 1/2 cup warm water and flavouring (I usually put about a tablespoon or two of vanilla in a measuring cup, and then make it up to 1/2 cup with warm water)
  • 4 cups icing sugar
  • 3 tbsp corn syrup (for smoothness and liquidity – not the monetary kind!)

In a stand mixing bowl (or large bowl if you are using handheld mixers), combine the meringue powder with the warm water and flavouring. If you dont want to use vanilla, use whatever flavour strikes your fancy.

Whisk on medium speed until the meringue powder has dissolved into the water, and begins to whip up – it will look just like whipped egg whites, and will have the same glossy, creamy consistency. This should take about 1 – 2 minutes.

Add the icing sugar and corn syrup, and beat for about 5 minutes on medium speed. Add additional warm water, a teaspoon at a time, if the consistency is too thick for your liking.

Colour with natural food colouring, and use immediately.

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White Chocolate Shortbread

11 Nov

I am in full on cookie baking mode. I just put about 200 Starry Starry Night cookies into the freezer, waiting to be baked tomorrow, and I decided to sit and think about what other kind of cookie I could make. I love shortbread – full, rich, simple and classic, but I wanted to give it a twist. As I looked in my store cupboard, I realised I had about a kilogram of Valrhona white chocolate waiting to be made into something fabulous.

I wanted to make white chocolate chip cookies, and I still may do that, but I wondered if there was a way to get white chocolate into a shortbread without making a shortbread with white chocolate chips. I wanted the white chocolate to be in every bite, to permeate the shortbread – to live in its essence 🙂 So I thought about it some more, and looked at the ingredients list – pretty simple, really. Butter, sugar, flour. Vanilla for additional flavour if needed, and a touch of salt. Thats it.

Well, I thought, if I were to add white chocolate, I could bring the sugar content down. But how to add the chocolate without melting it? Melting the chocolate and adding it to shortbread would, I thought, mess with the essential crumby-ness of this classic biscuit. It would make a nice cookie, but it wasnt what I wanted. I was still thinking about the sugar though, and then it came to me… Could I somehow crumb the white chocolate so that it was mixed in with the flour? I could blitz with my immersion blender – and lo! It worked!

This cookie is astoundingly good. Its surprising too – white chocolate just oozes out of its very heartbeat – but you dont see it when you bite into the cookie, so it taste is unexpected and wonderful. Crispy, rich, scented with vanilla and white chocolate, this cookie is so much more wicked than it looks. Enjoy it very soon, with someone you love very much 😉

Makes 8 triangles from a 9 or 10 inch pan

  • Approx 1 cup (5 oz/150 g) good quality white chocolate (I used Valrhona disks – otherwise, use a good chocolate bar and roughly chop), cold from the fridge
  • 1 1/4 cup all purpose flour
  • 1/4 tsp salt
  • 1/2 cup (8 tbsp) butter, softened
  • 1/4 cup light brown sugar
  • 1 tbsp vanilla

Place white chocolate, flour and salt in a large bowl. Using your hands, mix together until all the white chocolate is completely covered in flour. This is important for the next step, so please dont skip it!

If you are using a food processor or blender, place the flour chocolate mixture into the machine, and pulse lightly until the white chocolate has crumbed and completely integrated into the flour. If you are using an immersion blender, as I did, place the blender into the flour chocolate mixture, and pulse quickly. Move the bowl around, until all the chocolate has been incorporated into the flour. Set aside in the refrigerator while you prepare the butter mixture.

In a stand mixture, or using a hand held mixer, cream the butter until it is light and fluffy. This usually takes about a minute or two. Add the light brown sugar and cream until it is incorporated into the butter. Add vanilla and mix again.

Remove the flour mixture from the fridge, and add to the butter mixture, adding it in a few batches. The dough will come together quickly.

Butter a spring form pan or a tart pan (about 9 – 10 inches across), and place the dough in the centre. Using your hands, quickly push the dough so that it covers the entire bottom of the pan. Score wedges with a sharp knife (I cut it into 8 pizza wedges – you could do it however you wish), and poke holes in it with the tines of a fork.

Refrigerate the prepared dough for at least an hour, or overnight.

Once youre ready to bake the shortbread, preheat the oven to 175C (350F). Bake the shortbread for about 25 – 35 minutes. Check after about 15 minutes, and if its browning too fast, cover with a little aluminum foil to prevent it from burning. After about 25 minutes check again – it should be crumbly and firm to the touch.

Cool, in the pan, on a rack for about ten minutes. Re-score and re-hole if you feel the shortbread needs it! After about ten minutes, cut the shortbread through with an offset spatula or sharp knife, and allow to cool for a further ten to fifteen minutes. Serve immediately and enjoy!

If you have any leftover, cover and refrigerate for up to 2 weeks.

 

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Adi’s Cookies

26 Oct

Inspirational!Today was a lovely chilled day, reconnecting with the KL I love so much … seeing friends, being inspired and challenged by strong women. My beloved friend, Adi, gave me a beautiful gift – an astonishingly lovely vanilla bean paste that she brought back from holidays in Bali … and this paste was truly magical. It was a mix of vanilla bean, cacao nibs and chili! What a taste combination … and what a scent. When I opened the jar this deep spicy dark chocolatey vanilla musk wafted out and assailed me with its deliciousness.

I couldnt wait to cook with it … and it set me to thinking. Pastes are such a lovely conglomeration of tastes – this one in particular has a balance of dark deep flavours, invigorated by a faint sting of chili. Beautiful! I decided I was going to make refrigerator cookies with the paste, and I also dreamed up a whole variety of other pastes I could make inspired by this one.

If you cant put your hands on a vanilla, cacao nib, chili paste (and unless youre in Bali, and visiting the Puri Ganesha Villas where it was concocted, I doubt you can!), you can make your own paste from any number of wonderful combinations.

Just pound together a few ingredients that inspire you – a mortar and pestle would do well by you here – and bake some cookies or make a cake with the paste as your flavouring inspiration.

Here are a few that come to mind:

  • Crystallised ginger, cranberries and cinnamon
  • Grated lemon and orange peel, hazelnuts and raisins
  • Mint, cacao nibs, and pineapple
  • Dried blueberries, saffron, and almonds
  • Macadamias, a touch of honey, and nutmeg

Once you have a paste that you love, you can add it to so many things – to cakes and glazes. You could stir some into a pudding or ice cream. Use it to perfume a cupcake or frosting. Rub it onto an apple before baking, or stir it into a fruit crumble… you will have a haunting, unique flavour that will intrigue and delight.

Or you could make these cookies. I love refrigerator cookies. Basically, you make a simple cookie dough, lushly rich with creamed butter and sugar, and flavoured with the paste of your choice, and refrigerate the dough, rolled into logs, for at least a few hours. This allows the butter to firm up, and then you just slice the cookies and bake for a few minutes. Any left overs, you can freeze for up to six months, so you always have fresh cookies to hand. What a pleasure and a luxury! And once you have a paste that you love, the entire process takes literally 20 minutes to put together!

Enjoy this recipe, and be comforted. And thank you to Adi for inspiring me in so many ways!

Makes about 48 cookies / 2 logs

  • 2 sticks (16 tbsp) butter, at room temperature
  • 1 cup light brown sugar
  • 1 egg
  • 1 tbsp sour cream (or you could use cream cheese – or even leave this out – I just love the slight tang this provides)
  • 2 – 4 tsp vanilla, cacao nib and chili paste (or one that you make up!)
  • 2 1/2 cups unbleached organic cake flour
  • 1 tsp baking powder
  • 1/4 – 1/2 tsp sea salt (I used 1/2 tsp because I wanted to bring out the spice note of the chili – use less if your flavour combinations are softer)
  • 1 tbsp milk or buttermilk

In a stand mixer, fitted with a flat paddle, or a electric hand beater, cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. This takes a few minutes, so be patient. Its not just mixed together, but actually starts to fluff up…

Add the egg and sour cream and mix well. Add 2 teaspoons of the vanilla paste and taste – adjust if needed.

In a separate bowl, mix together the flour, baking powder and sea salt. Add to the butter mixture in three batches, adding a touch of milk in between each batch to keep the dough soft and pliable. Mix in the flour very briefly, just until the dough comes together, then add a bit of milk, mix again, etc.

Once all the flour has been incorporated, turn the dough out onto a long strip of waxed paper. Divide the dough into half, and roll out into a thick log. Wrap tightly in separate pieces of waxed paper, and refrigerate for at least 2 hours, or freeze until you are ready to use.

When you are ready to bake some cookies (and I have to ask myself, when am I not?!), preheat the oven to 200C (400F)

Line a cookie tin with greaseproof paper, and take out a log of cookie dough. Cut slices about 1/8th inch thick from the log, and arrange on baking sheet. They wont spread very far, so they dont need to be very far apart.

Bake for 6 – 10 minutes, until the edges are just starting to brown, and the cookies are firm to the touch. Cool on racks for a few minutes before devouring.

Enjoy and be inspired!

PS – forgive the blurry photograph, am still sorting through my luggage looking for my camera!

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Banoffee Pie

2 Jul

This is not the traditional recipe for Banoffee Pie. For that, you will have to go here.

But this is the banoffee pie of my childhood. A cookie crumb crust made with HobNobs and melted butter. A thick dark golden brown slather of dulce de leche. Bananas. And a mound of unsweetened vanilla whipped cream. Each on its own, good. Combined together. Nirvana. Honestly. And its one of those desserts that you learn to make from very young, and because its so easy (given the preparedness of the ingredients), you feel a sense of achievement and satisfaction when it is served to ooohs and aaahs.

Assembly is easy, and you can certainly make this divine pudding over a few days, and assemble a few hours before serving. Its really good as breakfast too. Heh.

Crust

  • 3/4 roll of Hobnobs
  • 1/2 cup melted butter

Put about 3/4 roll of HobNob cookies in a zip loc plastic bag. You should have may be 5 or 6 left (good for a cook’s tea!). Break them up a bit using your hands, and then, using any heavy object (the bottom of a wine bottle will come in handy here) smash and crush the biscuits to a fine pebbly sand. You might need to do this in two batches.

Pour the crushed biscuits into an 8 inch round, non stick, springform cake pan. Pour the melted butter over, and mix. Using your fingers, create a crust at the bottom, and about half way up the sides of the pan. Put in the fridge for about 20 minutes to harden up a bit.

Whipped cream

I stabilise my whipped cream with agar agar, which is a vegetarian gelatin made from seaweed. Its totally flavourless, and about 1 tsp of agar agar to 1 cup of cream ensures the cream stays whipped and high, even after 12 hours in the fridge.

You will need to whip:

  • 2 cups heavy cream
  • 2 tsp agar agar
  • 2 tsp vanilla essence

together until they hold hard peaks. Set aside for the assembly.

Assembly

Take the crust out of the fridge, and pour in the cooled dulce de leche. It should completely coat the bottom of the crust, and be about 1/4 inch thick. If you want more, go ahead and add more, just remember it is VERY sweet.

Take about 6 -9 small pisang mas bananas (or whatever is available for you), and slice lengthwise. You should get about 3 long slices from each banana. Layer the bananas over the dulce de leche. Put in the fridge for about 20 minutes to firm up again.

Cover the entire pie with the unsweetened whipped cream, and refrigerate for at least 2 hours, and up to 24.

When you are ready to serve, run a knife around the edges, and unmold the springform pan gently.

Serve with love and gratitude.

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