Sweet Banana Dutch Baby

For about 3 seconds this morning I convinced myself that I was a brilliant culinary genius. Ha! Pure hubris. I made something I always make and added another thing I sometimes make and it was really very good. I just got lucky. The fact that both things are so incredibly easy to do is the icing on the cake, so to speak.

Yes, this is breakfast and even though I am sort of committed to dinner and generally not all that interested in breakfast, this morning I made a Dutch Baby with Caramel Bananas and it was fabulous. We have a tradition in our house of eating a large slice of birthday cake in bed the morning following a birthday dinner. So I’d already eaten a big piece of banana caramel cream birthday cake. I hadn’t actually planned on having a real breakfast at all. Yet there I was, standing at the kitchen counter, sneaking a large corner of the pancake that I had made “for the kids”, mashing the custardy remains into the brown sugar syrupy leftover bananas in a bowl. The high note tang of the lemon was underscored by the dulce de leche sweetness of brown sugar.  It was dreamy.

I am a big fan of eating something very delicious and over the top in bed (like birthday cake), especially with a big cup of coffee and these Dutch babies would have been perfect. Add a good book, the sun streaming through an open window and that crisp earthy early spring smell coming in – what could be nicer than that?

Dutch Babies with Caramel Bananas

Dutch Baby – Joy of Cooking

20-22 minutes – start to finish

generously serves 4

• 1 cup milk
• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 4 large eggs
• 1 stick unsalted butter
• powdered sugar and lemon slices to serve

1. Preheat the oven to 425 F.
2. Set the oven rack in the middle of the oven, leaving the space above clear.  This pancake will rise.
3. Place 9 x 13 Pyrex pan in the oven with the stick of butter, cut into 6 pieces, in it to melt.  Don’t forget about it and burn it.  Just melt it.
4. Whisk the milk, flour, sugar and eggs together in a medium sized bowl.
5. Pour the contents of the bowl into the melted butter.
6. Bake 15- 17 minutes. Call your children into the kitchen just before you pull it from the oven. The batter will have risen to great heights around the edges and become deeply browned.  The middle with be almost custardy and glisten with hot butter.
7. Sift powdered sugar over the surface and serve immediately with lemon slices on the side.

Haydee’s Microwave Bananas – Best Food Writing 2003

4 Servings

3 minutes start to finish – you should start the bananas after the Dutch Baby has been in the oven for 10 minutes

The name doesn’t do them justice.

• 2 ripe bananas – peeled and sliced into 1/2″ thick slices
• 2 tbsp unsalted butter
• 2 heaping tbsp brown sugar
• 1/4 tsp cinnamon (I never do the cinnamon but the original recipe includes it)

1. Place bananas, butter, sugar and cinnamon into microwave safe bowl and cook on high for 1 or 2 minutes.
2. Spoon onto Dutch Baby.