Ah (or maybe ugh), to be the sole female sibling running a family-owned business some 70 years ago. In 1951, the late Ella Brennan, manager of the still-famous Brennan’s restaurant on New Orleans’ Bourbon Street, found herself saddled with one older fruit-broker brother unloading his banana surplus, and another one demanding she devise a dessert to honor of his crime-commissioner crony, Richard Foster. Ella’s epiphany—bananas sautéed in brown sugar, butter, and combustible liquor, then torched—remains a top reason to eat in the Crescent City. Our Bananas Foster recipe uses banana liqueur in addition to classic rum, heightening the banana flavor in this caramelized dessert.
When choosing a banana liqueur, steer clear of the artificially flavored party mixers. We fuel the flames with Giffard’s Banane du Brésil, made with real bananas and cognac, and finished in oak barrels.
Featured in: “Cook a Swanky Steakhouse Dinner at Home with These Old-School Recipes,” by Anna Hirschorn and “New Orleans” by Lolis Eric Elie in the April 2013 special feature.
!function(n){if(!window.cnx){window.cnx={},window.cnx.cmd=[];var t=n.createElement(‘iframe’);t.display=’none’,t.onload=function(){var n=t.contentWindow.document,c=n.createElement(‘script’);c.src=’//cd.connatix.com/connatix.player.js’,c.setAttribute(‘async’,’1′),c.setAttribute(‘type’,’text/javascript’),n.body.appendChild(c)},n.head.appendChild(t)}}(document); cnx.cmd.push(function () { cnx({ playerId: “f0c581a1-3370-4610-a38d-0c71df428e7e”, mediaId: “094349a3-e69f-4295-b9bd-31155ca33c89”, settings: { playbackMode: cnx.configEnums.PlaybackModeEnum.ClickToPlay, rendering: { containerSelector: “#div-094349a3-e69f-4295-b9bd-31155ca33c89”, insertPosition: cnx.configEnums.InsertPositionEnum.ReplaceContainer } } }).render(“094349a3-e69f-4295-b9bd-31155ca33c89”); }); Yield: 4–6 Time: 15 minutes 4 ripe medium bananas, peeled 8 Tbsp. unsalted butter 1 cup light-brown sugar, packed 1⁄2 tsp. ground cinnamon 1⁄4 cup banana liqueur 1⁄4 cup dark rum Vanilla
