your new no-bake bestie of a recipe
brown butter banana pudding, I mean come on
hey hi hello!!
Welcome back to bake chats :) Today is gonna be a real win for those of you who hate a lengthy intro (sorry- I am a certified yapper once ya get me going!) But, I’m in the middle of moving + unpacking in this heat wave so ya know what? I don’t have it in me to yap. Enjoy it while it lasts because this will NOT be the norm.
I will preface with- I had Magnolia Bakery’s banana pudding for the first time last month (my first banana pudding ever actually) and holy fuck. Y’all were not lying, it’s sooooo good. It’s so simple, which is part of what makes it absolutely so perfect.
A few people replied to the Insta story with, “when are we getting your recreation of this??” And my thing about developing and sharing recipes is, it’s only worth doing if I’m adding to the conversation in some way. Banana pudding has been made and shared thousands of times. Magnolia Bakery themselves has shared the secret to their sauce, so like, why would you need me to recreate it when it already exists 1000x over, close to the same way each time. Always some iteration of vanilla pudding (sometimes banana or cheesecake)- homemade or instant, folded into whipped cream- fresh or cool, bananas- obvi and nilla wafers or the occasional chessman cookie. I’m not saying every recipe needs to reinvent the wheel but I think it gets to a point where a recipe has been recreated so many times over that we need to bring a new perspective, your own unique point of view. Ya know, piggy backing on the whole idea of recipe riffin’ but, who’s to say ya can’t use chocolate, pistachio, or butterscotch pudding? or brown butter pastry cream? ;)
So, much for not yapping. But, my version of the perfect banana pudding is brown butter pastry cream folded into a mascarpone + sour cream whip with nilla wafers and bananas all topped with a layer of vanilla whip cream because like, if you’re gonna do it, do it big.
This is also perf for these hot ass end of summer days, when you don’t want to turn the oven on. You still need to turn on the stove for the pastry cream, but it’s not too long and totally worth it. Thankfully for me, I use a little induction burner that doesn’t generate much heat.
Let’s get right to it shall we?
xx
SIKE omg got ya!! Thought I wasn’t gonna yap? I just have one more thing to say, on riffin vs developing a recipe.
When I first set out to make this pudding I had intended for it to be a quick lil recipe riff because I had some left over brown butter pastry cream from another recipe I was working on. It was good in a way that was fine. Like, nothing special- still you know… edible. But, not like oh my god WOWie. I could have left it there and never made it again. It did what it need to do- use up left over pastry cream and scratch the banana pudding itch.
In trying it though, it was like okay wow this can be so much better if I “just” doubled the amount of extra milk powder when I brown the butter for the pastry cream. It could also be a little sweeter so we will bump up the sugar in the pastry cream but also add some to the whip before making the bavarian. More salt usually helps to we will increase that too. Ya know what? Let’s add some mascarpone and sour cream to the mix to enhance flavor and texture. Let’s also increase the amount of bavarian (pc +whip) to banana & nilla wafer ratio. so. much. better. The type of pudding that has people asking for the recipe, telling you it’s the one of the best banana puddings they ever had!
I have roommates now, and they are the taste testers behind all my recipes, which is nice. So they get to try the recipes at different points in the process. They’re starting to understand how it works. Because, it’s like “oh this again??” and I’m like “Yeah, but different. better.” This one to them was night and day. I could tell the first version they were fine with but just not about it. The next day, version two, the way their faces lit up with the first bite. You could tell we had a winner. That’s what developing a recipe is, making it once but then tweaking it until it’s something special, something as close to perfect as you can get.
*This post has a few affiliate links, which if you click and purchase from I receive compensation at no additional cost to you*
BROWN BUTTER BANANA PUDDING
Letting ya know now, this is an overnight endeavor. You will have to let the final pudding hang out in the fridge overnight before diving in. Plan accordingly.
OVERVIEW:
Active time: 45 minutes to 1 hour
Chill/inactive time: Overnight chill before serving
Over all the tools you’re going to need to make this pudding are
Mixing bowls
Whisk
Rubber spatula
Cutting board
Knife
Immersion blender *optional*
BROWN BUTTER PASTRY CREAM
We’re gonna start off by browning some butter with a couple of tablespoons of milk powder to bring even more brown butter flavor to the custard. a fun bonus is you can brown the butter and while it cools you can make the pastry cream in the same saucepan to make sure you get every bit of flavor. And also, like one less dish. WIN/WIN.
You can make the pastry cream a day ahead to let it cool and set in the fridge before folding it into the whipped cream. But, you can also use an ice bath to chill it down quickly to “immediately” fold into the whip, which typically cools it down in like 30-45 minutes. This what I chose to do in this recipe since the pudding itself does best with an overnight chill in the fridge, so making it a 3 day wait before I can eat it is just tew much…
Omg look at me yapping my ass off again BUT, I’ve also found that it’s much easier to whisk all the ingredients together and cook the custard straight up rather than heating the milk and tempering into the sugar yolk mixture. So ya know, that’s a little change to my classic pastry cream recipe you’ll see here :)
INGREDIENTS:
113 grams butter, unsalted
2 tablespoons non-fat milk powder
600 grams whole milk
1 teaspoon diamond crystal kosher salt
150 grams dark brown sugar
33 grams cornstarch
160 grams egg yolks (approx 8 large yolks)
2 tablespoons vanilla bean paste
DIRECTIONS:
In a medium saucepan heat the 113 grams of unsalted butter over medium heat until melted.
Once the butter has melted add in the 2 tablespoons of non-fat milk powder.
Cook the butter over medium heat, whisking frequently to keep the milk solids moving. The added solids have a tendency to clump together otherwise. The butter will start to foam, sizzle and steam. Keep whisking as the milk solids begin to brown. The butter will begin to smell nutty and caramelized. The browned butter is ready when the milk solids are deep umber in color and the steaming has stopped. Quickly and carefully, pour the brown butter into a heat proof bowl to cool down. Since we’re adding it back into the final pastry cream, there isn’t a need to cool it down fully.
Fill a large bowl with ice water to create an ice batch for the custard when it’s done cooking. The bowl you fill should be larger than the one you strain your custard into.
To the same saucepan add in the 600 grams of whole milk and swirl around to make sure you get all the stray brown bits of butter (the flavor bombs!!). To the milk add the 150 grams dark brown sugar, 1 teaspoon diamond crystal kosher salt, 33 grams cornstarch, 160 grams of egg yolks and 2 tablespoons of vanilla bean paste. Whisking until everything is homogenous.
Place the saucepan over medium heat. Whisk the mixture constantly to avoid scrambling. Cook the custard until it begins to thicken and reaches a soft boil (a few slow popping and thick bubbles will form when you stop whisking for a second)
At this point remove your cream from the heat and strain into a heat safe mixing bowl. This is the final frontier to make sure you don’t have any scrambled eggy bits in your cream. Add your reserved brown butter from earlier and immersion blend until smooth. If you don’t have an immersion blender you can just whisk to combine. The immersion blender though leaves you with the most perfect creamy texture. Cover the top of the custard directly with plastic wrap to keep a skin from forming.
Place the bowl of custard into the prepared ice bath from earlier.
Every 5 or so minutes remove the plastic and agitate the custard to it cools down quickly and evenly. Replace the plastic and repeat until the custard has cooled to about 70F before starting to make your whipped cream.
BROWN BUTTER BANANA PUDDING
The bananas you choose will play a big role in the perceived sweetness of the final product. I like going for barely ripe enough bananas- the ones that still have a touch of green to ‘em. If ya like your pudding a little sweeter with more of a pronounced banana flavor go for something on the riper side.
Also, we are skipping this game of layer the wafers with bananas then a layer of cream until it’s all gone. Just fold everything together. It’s quicker. and I think has a better distribution of wafer to banana to puds.
INGREDIENTS
1 batch of the brown butter pastry cream recipe from above
450 grams heavy cream
250 grams mascarpone cheese
200 grams sour cream
100 grams dark brown sugar
4-5 medium bananas, depends how much ya like bananas
1 box of nilla wafers (hold 10 back for crushing over top if you’d like)
Optional, but if you’d like to top your pudding with another layer of whipped cream you’ll also need
525 grams heavy cream
2 teaspoons vanilla bean paste
1/4 teaspoon diamond crystal kosher salt
90 grams powdered sugar
DIRECTIONS
Once your pastry cream has cooled, you’ll start to prepare your whip.
In a large bowl combine 450 grams heavy cream with the 250 grams mascarpone cheese, 200 grams sour cream, and 100 grams dark brown sugar. Using a hand mixer (or stand mixer) whip this until very soft medium peaks form. You don’t want to go too stiff here. The cream should be just thick enough to hold its shape but still fall into itself as a little time passes.
Gently fold the brown butter pastry cream into the whipped cream in 3 additions.
Peel the 4-5 bananas and slice them into about 1/4” thick slices.
To the brown butter whip situation add the sliced bananas folding to incorporate before adding in the box of nilla wafers, scant ten wafers. Once again folding until everything is evenly distributed.
Dump the pudding into a 9x13” dish. Spreading it out evenly with a small off set spatula.
You can stop here and cover with plastic wrap storing in the fridge overnight. But, if you’re popping a lactaid tomorrow might as well get a lil frisky.
Whip up another 525 grams of heavy cream with 2 teaspoons vanilla bean paste, 1/4 teaspoon kosher salt and 90 grams of powdered sugar to medium/stiff peaks.
Layer the vanilla whip over the banana pudding, spreading it even with an offset spatula.
Cover directly with plastic wrap. Store in the fridge overnight (at least 4 hours) to give the wafers a chance to soften and the flavors to develop.
Before serving, crush the reserved nilla wafers and sprinkle over top.
Enjoy!!
Till the next one my bake chat baddies <333
