Banh Chuoi Nuong (Baked Banana and Coconut Cake)

Ingredients

• 8 banana, very ripe and heavily speckled
• 180 g white sugar
• 250 g baguette, day-old and torn into small pieces
• 4 dl coconut milk
• ½ tsp salt
• 2 tsp vanilla extract
• 2 egg
• 70 g butter, melted
• 60 g desiccated coconut
• 2 tbsp sesame seeds, toasted

Method

1. 1.

   Macerate the bananas — Slice the bananas into 1 cm rounds, toss them with 100 g of the sugar and leave to macerate for 30 minutes. They will slump and release a thin, dark syrup that carries most of the cake's flavour.

2. 2.

   Soak the bread in coconut milk — Warm the coconut milk with the remaining sugar, the salt and the vanilla until it steams but does not boil. Pour it over the torn bread, press the pieces under with a fork and leave to soak for 15 minutes, until no dry crumb remains.

3. 3.

   Enrich the batter — Heat the oven to 180 C and brush a 20 x 25 cm baking dish with a little of the melted butter, right up the sides. Beat the eggs and the remaining butter into the soaked bread, then stir in the desiccated coconut.

4. 4.

   Fold in the fruit and fill the dish — Fold in the bananas and every drop of their syrup, keeping a dozen of the best slices back. Scrape the mixture into the dish, level it and shingle the reserved slices over the surface.

5. 5.

   Bake to a dark caramel — Bake for 50-55 minutes, until the top is deeply caramelised almost to the edge of burnt and the centre no longer wobbles when you nudge the dish. Cover loosely with foil if it colours too fast in the first half hour.

6. 6.

   Cool before slicing — Cool in the dish for at least 1 hour: warm, it is a pudding, but cold it sets to a dense, sliceable custard. Cut into squares, scatter with the sesame seeds and serve at room temperature.