Banoffee Cupcakes

Moist banana cupcakes filled with dulce de leche and topped with whipped chantilly cream ~

Banoffee  pie is a traditional English dessert that combines banana, toffee and whipped cream in a delicious pie. For my cupcake version I used dulce de leche to get a toffee like flavour. You probably already know this, but you can either buy ready made dulce de leche or use condensed milk and try one these methods to make your own. I used condensed milk and went for the oven option as this one sounded the safest! (I already have some lovely burn scars down the right side of my body after I managed to spill a whole cafetiere of coffee down me last spring, so it’s probably not a good idea for me to be playing with anything where there’s a chance of very hot liquid exploding!) My dulce de leche reached a perfect caramel consistency after an hour and a half in the oven.

For the cupcakes –
1 ripe banana, cut into small pieces
40g/ 1 1/2 oz/ 1/3 stick unsalted butter, at room temperature
120g/ 4 oz/ 2/3 cup soft light brown sugar
1 egg
100g/ 3 1/2 oz/ 2/3 cup plain flour
1 tsp baking powder
pinch salt
75ml/ 1/3 cup milk
6 tsp dulce de leche

For the whipped cream –
150ml/ 1/4 pint double cream/ heavy cream
1/2 tsp vanilla paste or 1 tsp vanilla extract

makes 6 cupcakes

To make the cupcakes –
– Preheat the oven to 180°C/ 350°F/ gas mark 4 and line a cupcake or muffin tin with cupcake cases.
– Whisk together the chopped banana, butter, sugar and egg until smooth and creamy.
– Fold in the flour, baking powder and salt until just combined.
– Whisk in the milk.
– Spoon the mixture into the cupcakes cases, filling each one about 2/3 full.
– Bake for about 25 minutes until risen and golden brown.
– Leave to cool in the tin for 5 minutes before moving to a wire rack to cool completely.
– Once cooled cut a small hole out of the top of each cake and fill with a teaspoon dulce de leche per cake.

To make the whipped cream topping –
– Whisk together the cream and vanilla until soft peaks form. Pipe or spoon the cream onto each cupcake.