caramel sauce Archives - The Midnight Baker

Banoffee Pie Dessert

Judith Hannemann — Sat, 06 Apr 2013 23:00:00 +0000

Banoffee Pie Dessert

Do you love bananas? Do you love caramel or dulce de leche? What about whipped cream? Yes to all three? Then this is your dessert.

This is a popular dessert in Britain. I used to think the name was hilarious…it’s a contraction of the ingredients–BANanas and tOFFEE, hence “banoffee.”

Brits are fond of their toffee. While they don’t sell soft toffee here, a great equivalent would be caramel sauce or dulce de leche. Either will work well here. I used dulce de leche because frankly, I way dying to make it in the slow cooker. Since the operation was a total success, I opted for the dulce de leche instead of the caramel sauce.

I also cheated here and used whipped topping–but the extra-creamy variety. But if you are going to make this up and serve immediately, then an aerosol whipped cream such as Redi Whip will work perfectly.

These are easy to put together. The original recipe for the actual pie calls for a crust made out of digestive biscuits.

Digestives are whole grain cookies popular in UK–they’ve been around forever and a major manufacturer is McVittie’s. They can be bought in the USA, and they’ll be in the “imported” cookie section. They come either plain or coated with chocolate on bottom. Either variety will do. And if you can’t find digestives, good ole American graham crackers will do just nicely. In fact, they are related to one another in many ways.

All you do is break the cookie up into small bits for this…no fine crumbs. It’s easy to assemble with just layers of cookie, banana, toffee and cream.

Banoffee Pie Dessert

2 ripe bananas, sliced
1/4 cup (more or less) of dulce de leche or caramel sauce
1 cup (or abouts) extra-creamy whipped topping or whipped cream
4 digestive biscuits or
2 whole plain honey graham crackers

Break up the cookies into small bits.

Place 1/2 of the cookie bits in the bottom of 2 dessert dishes. Top with some banana slices, then top the banana slices with some dulce de leche or caramel sauce, add a scant 1/2 cup of whipped cream or topping on top of that, then top with the rest of the broken cookies and a dollop of the remaining topping/cream. Garnish with a banana slice.

Makes 2 desserts

Banoffee Pie Dessert

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Caramel Graham Cracker Parfait

Judith Hannemann — Fri, 22 Mar 2013 00:00:00 +0000

Caramel Graham Cracker Parfait

Anyone who lives in upstate New York is familiar with a family-owned convenience store called Stewart’s Shops and their famous ice cream.

They own and maintain their own dairies and have a stellar reputation in the area. One thing they are known for is their ice cream, and it’s many proprietary flavors.

One such flavor is “Crumbs Along the Mohawk,” which is so faintingly delicious, you can’t stop eating it or get it off your brain.

Caramel Graham Cracker Parfait

This heavenly concoction consists of a caramel/graham cracker flavored ice cream with bits of caramel coated graham cracker round thrown in. One taste and you’re hooked.

I love this so I decided to try to come up not with an ice cream, but an easy dessert that mimicked this flavor.

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Caramel Graham Cracker Parfait

This heavenly concoction consists of a caramel/graham cracker flavored ice cream with bits of caramel coated graham cracker round thrown in. One taste and you’re hooked.

Prep Time15

Total Time15

Course: desserts

Cuisine: American

Keyword: caramel, graham crackers, parfait recipe

Servings: 4

Calories: 435kcal

Author: Judith Hannemann

Ingredients

1 box instant butterscotch pudding mix
1 3/4 cup milk
1/2 up butterscotch morsels
1 tsp vegetable shortening like Crisco--don't use butter or margarine
2 whole graham crackers
2 cups whipped topping
1/2 cup caramel sauce

Instructions

Place milk and pudding mix in a medium bowl and whisk with a wire whisk for 1 minute. Refrigerate until set, about 1 hour.
Place graham crackers on a sheet of waxed paper. Melt butterscotch morsels and shortening in a microwave in a microwave-safe bowl for 1 minute on high; stir until no lumps remain. If there are lumps, microwave on high an additional 30 seconds. Pour melted butterscotch over graham crackers, spread to coat evenly. Chill until butterscotch is set.
Fold 1 cup of butterscotch pudding into the 2 cups of whipped topping. Break the butterscotch-coated grahams into small pieces.
In parfait or dessert cups, layer this way dividing evenly between 4 dessert cups:
plain pudding (about 2 tbs)
caramel sauce (about 1 tbs)
graham bits (about 1 tbs)
whipped topping mixture (about 3 tbs)
repeat 1 more time in all dessert cups
Decorate top with a dollop of whipped topping and any remaining graham bits.
Drizzle remaining caramel sauce over the top.

Nutrition

Caramel Graham Cracker Parfait

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Caramel Apple Cheesecake Tart

Judith Hannemann — Wed, 13 Mar 2013 04:00:00 +0000

Caramel Apple Cheesecake Tart

What do you get when you combine a sweet pastry crust, apple pie filling, blobs of cheesecake, a crumb topping and caramel sauce? Caramel apple cheesecake tart, of course! And don’t let it’s look fool you–this is as easy as 1-2-3 and it’s not too bad calorie-wise either!

The pastry is as simple as can be–no rolling involved and entirely made in the food processor. As to the apples, pretty simple opening a can, huh? And the cheesecake filling just has 4 ingredients, speedily mixed all together in a matter of minutes. The most difficult things are the crumbs–kidding of course, but you do have to melt the butter and get out a small saucepan

Doesn’t break the calorie bank!

To further reduce fat and calories, you can substitute Neufchatel (now known as “low-fat cream cheese”) for the regular–but don’t use non-fat. It just won’t set up.

Sugar-free apple filling can be used too as well as fresh apples. Only thing I would not recommend is monkeying with ingredients in the crust nor using non-fat alternatives to the regular and reduced fat versions. Often quite bad results occur–one day I’ll post about a “cheesecake” I made with non-fat cream cheese. Picked it up by mistake as the packaging was almost the same as the regular. It’s a horrid substance, but that’s another posting entirely LOL.

You can be completely decadent and serve this warmed with a scoop of vanilla ice cream on top, or not be fancy and just serve plain and chilled. Choice and extra calories are yours.

Just ENJOY.

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Caramel Apple Cheesecake Tart

What do you get when you combine a sweet pastry crust, apple pie filling, blobs of cheesecake, a crumb topping and caramel sauce? Caramel apple cheesecake tart, of course!

Prep Time30

Cook Time45

Total Time1 15

Course: desserts

Cuisine: American

Keyword: apples, caramel, cheesecake tarts

Servings: 8

Calories: 494kcal

Author: Judith Hannemann

Ingredients

FRENCH PATISSERIE - real fancy, but a simple butter pastry:

1 1/4 cup unsifted flour
1/4 cup confectioner's sugar
1/4 tsp salt
4 OZ stick cold unsalted butter, cut in small chunks
1 egg yolk reserve the white for the filling
1 tbs cold water

APPLE CHEESECAKE FILLING

1 can apple pie filling
1 8- oz pkg cream cheese room temp
1 whole egg + reserved egg white
1/4 cup sugar
2 tbsp sour cream

CRUMB TOPPING

4 tbsp butter melted
1/4 cup brown sugar
1/2 tsp cinnamon
3/4 cup flour
2 tbsp sliced almonds reserve
1/4 cup caramel sauce for drizzle

Instructions

For Pastry:
Place flour, confectioner's sugar and salt in the bowl of a food processor fitted with the "S" blade (that's the standard blade). Pulse a few times to combine.
Add butter chunks and pulse until mixture resembles small peas.
Beat egg yolk and cold water together. With food processor running, add the egg/water mixture through the feed tube, only adding enough to make dough "ball"--depending on weather conditions, you may have to add a few more drops of water.
Remove the dough from the food processor, wrap in waxed paper or plastic wrap and keep in refrigerator until ready for use. You can keep this up to 3 days.
Press pastry into a 10-inch quiche/tart pan, bringing pastry up the sides. You may also use a springform pan of a similar size, but only bring the pastry about 1/2 to 1-inch up the sides.
For the Crumbs:
Mix the melted butter, cinnamon and brown sugar well. Add flour, about 1/4 cup at a time until good, firm crumbs are made. You may not have to use all the flour, or you may have to use a tablespoon or so more. Your eye must be the judge of the proper consistency.
For Filling:
Beat cream cheese and sugar until smooth.
Add eggs and beat until very smooth. Stir in sour cream.
Add apple pie filling to cream cheese mixture and just cut a knife through the mixture a few times--you don't want to mix it well, just "marble" it.
Putting It All Together:
Spread on top of crust in quiche pan. Top with crumbs. Sprinkle with sliced almonds.
Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Place pan on a baking sheet, preferably lined with parchment.
Bake at 425 degrees for 10 minutes. Reduce temperature to 350 degrees and bake an additional 30-35 minutes or until center of tart is almost set.
Remove from oven and cool on rack. You may serve this slightly warm or well chilled. However you serve it, drizzle each serving with caramel sauce.

Nutrition

Caramel Apple Cheescake Tart

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