A simple, delicious dessert with warm bananas and a creamy coconut caramel sauce.

Here’s a quickly-scaled dessert idea that you can whip up anytime and is especially useful when you find yourself with bananas that rapidly approaching their use-by date. 

The coconut caramel, sweet and wonderfully creamy, is easy beyond belief – no fiddling around with sugar thermometers required. Don’t worry if it seems too thin on the stovetop, as it thickens up beautifully once you put it in the fridge.

I get out my chargrill pan for this, though you need to know that it works perfectly well if you grill your bananas under a hot overhead grill (broiler) or, indeed, the barbecue if that’s up and running.

I like the little sweet  “lady finger” bananas with this, though of course it works just as well with any bananas you have to hand.

Fried bananas with coconut caramel

Serves 2.

125ml (½ cup) coconut milk
4 tablespoons (¼ cup) light brown sugar
¼ teaspoon sea salt flakes
2 tablespoons butter
1 teaspoon olive oil
2 bananas
2 tablespoons coconut flakes
2 tablespoons pecans, chopped

To make the coconut caramel, place the coconut milk, brown sugar and salt in a small saucepan over medium-high heat. Bring it up to a boil, turn the heat down a little to medium and stir until the sugar has dissolved.

Continue to cook, stirring occasionally, for 5 minutes, until dark, fragrant and beginning to thicken. Remove from the heat, let it cool slightly, and pour into a small bowl. Refrigerate for at least 30 minutes.

Heat a dry frying pan over medium-high heat and toast the coconut flakes. until lightly golden. Transfer to a small bowl and set aside.

Add the butter and olive oil (to stop the butter burning) to the pan. Peel and halve the bananas lengthways and cook in the butter for about 3 minutes a side, until golden.

Transfer the bananas to serving plates, drizzle some of the coconut caramel over and sprinkle with coconut flakes and pecans.