I still haven't gotten over my irrational fear of deep frying, so I was not enthused about this week's Baked Sunday Mornings recipe, Bananas Foster Fritters. Prior to making this recipe, I have only deep fried once before in my entire life, and that was for the farm stand buttermilk doughnut recipe from Baked Explorations.
Except for the frying part, this recipe is easy. You can make the sauce is less than five minutes by heating butter and dark brown sugar, adding heavy cream and heating the mixture to a boil, and then adding rum, banana liqueur (I happen to have a bottle of créme de banana that I originally bought to make banana pudding), and cinnamon. The fritter batter also comes together quickly; mash bananas and mix in rum, banana liqueur, and melted butter, and then fold in the dry ingredients (flour, dark brown sugar, baking powder, salt, allspice, and cinnamon).
I used a #24 scoop to drop balls of dough into the hot oil to fry. I only fried three at a time and the recipe yielded a dozen total. The recipe specifically says not to overcook or burn the fritters, so I took out my first batch when they were golden brown -- only to discover that they were still completely raw in the middle. I was careful with subsequent batches to keep them in the oil a bit longer (closely monitoring the oil temperature the entire time), so the fritters were quite dark when I pulled them out of the oil and placed them on some paper towels to drain. After a little sprinkle of powdered sugar mixed with cinnamon, the fritters were ready to serve.
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Thankfully, the rest of my fritters were cooked through. The fritters are pretty awesome; the banana-spice flavor is perfect, and they have a great firm exterior and a soft, delectable interior. The sauce has lovely notes of caramel and banana, but it's pretty high octane and the flavor is mostly dominated by the rum (so not my favorite, but I really can't stand the flavor of rum). Eaten warm, the fritter definitely evoked the feeling of being at a fair or an amusement park. I served them to a small group assembled in our man cave to watch the Packers-49ers game, and they were a perfect game food.
I'm still not a fan of frying, but I can see myself making these fritters again. While fritters are food you might buy at the fair, these would be equally appropriate to serve at the end of a fancy dinner (and I think it's increasingly common to see doughnuts offered for dessert at fine dining restaurants). These fritters are true comfort food, elevated.
Recipe: "Bananas Foster Fritters" from Baked Explorations: Classic American Desserts Reinvented, by Matt Lewis and Renato Poliafito, recipe available here at Baked Sunday Mornings.
Previous Posts:
Except for the frying part, this recipe is easy. You can make the sauce is less than five minutes by heating butter and dark brown sugar, adding heavy cream and heating the mixture to a boil, and then adding rum, banana liqueur (I happen to have a bottle of créme de banana that I originally bought to make banana pudding), and cinnamon. The fritter batter also comes together quickly; mash bananas and mix in rum, banana liqueur, and melted butter, and then fold in the dry ingredients (flour, dark brown sugar, baking powder, salt, allspice, and cinnamon).
I used a #24 scoop to drop balls of dough into the hot oil to fry. I only fried three at a time and the recipe yielded a dozen total. The recipe specifically says not to overcook or burn the fritters, so I took out my first batch when they were golden brown -- only to discover that they were still completely raw in the middle. I was careful with subsequent batches to keep them in the oil a bit longer (closely monitoring the oil temperature the entire time), so the fritters were quite dark when I pulled them out of the oil and placed them on some paper towels to drain. After a little sprinkle of powdered sugar mixed with cinnamon, the fritters were ready to serve.
.JPG)
I'm still not a fan of frying, but I can see myself making these fritters again. While fritters are food you might buy at the fair, these would be equally appropriate to serve at the end of a fancy dinner (and I think it's increasingly common to see doughnuts offered for dessert at fine dining restaurants). These fritters are true comfort food, elevated.
Recipe: "Bananas Foster Fritters" from Baked Explorations: Classic American Desserts Reinvented, by Matt Lewis and Renato Poliafito, recipe available here at Baked Sunday Mornings.
Previous Posts:
- "Baked Sunday Mornings: Farm Stand Buttermilk Doughnuts," January 16, 2011.
- "DamGood Indeed: Banana Pudding with Vanilla Wafer Crumble," February 23, 2012.
- "The Booze Plays Top Banana: Rum Cake," February 29, 2012.
Comments
I made the farmstand donuts on the first on January... That recipe alone is worth getting over your fear of frying!
My husband has been telling me over and over again that if you fry correctly it doesn't produce a grease-sodden product, and I feel like that was the case with these fritters. They really weren't greasy like I expected them to be. They were very donut like!
And what Bourbonnatrix said - those farmstand donuts are amazing.