Banana Pudding from Leftovers

 I don’t know why but my family is the kind that love something, then they will buy that thing but just won’t finish the whole thing. They’d just leave a little bit. Like for example my grandma, brother, and dad LOVES banana flavoured milk. They’ll buy 3 cartoons, finish the 2 and somehow for the last one they’ll just drink most of it and leave about half a cup for a couple days. And if no one noticed it’s just going to be there for days until it’s gone bad. I just can’t let that happen so I’ll taste it and if it’s fine I’ll make something out of it.

Leftover Snacks or Biscuits

Another thing about my family is that we often receive a lot of snacks. Sometimes snacks that we’re familiar with, sometimes we’re not. And for those that are new to us we’ll want to keep them, then we’ll have a taste and if it’s okay we’ll keep it. But it will just be there on the table for a long time, I guess because it’s new to us we just don’t go for it as often. Then we’ll just forget about it and it’s gone stale. But again I’ll try to use it.

Leftover Cream-based Frostings

Also have you ever made too much frosting and have some leftovers? I have. I made a fruit tart for my best friend’s birthday and topped it with cream cheese frosting and had some leftovers. I couldn’t throw it out, so I had to think of something. And that’s how I came up with this recipe. I’ve made banana pudding before that used custard lightened with whipped cream, then layer it with biscuits and bananas. I thought I’d do the same with these ingredients I had on hand.

Make it Your Own!

You can definitely adjust and play around with what you have on hand. With this kind of recipe as long as each component tastes good, the outcome will taste good! For example, if you only have plain milk, you can add more sugar, more vanilla, or maybe some cocoa powder, matcha powder, or other flavour. 

Don’t have leftover frosting? You can use whipped cream. Don’t have that too? Just leave out and just use the custard, though the texture won’t be as light.

For the biscuits, I used digestive biscuits in my original banana pudding recipe. But the one I had was bolpis kring which was a dried banana bread. But you can definitely use any kind of crispy biscuits, the almost-stale ones are good since we want them to soften anyway.

I also use bananas for some freshness. But you can use any fruit you want, let's say you make the chocolate one, you can use strawberries. With vanilla you can definitely use any fruit, maybe like mango, kiwi, etc. Don’t want fruits? You can use spread or jams, maybe spread some peanut butter, red bean paste, or strawberry jam on your biscuit before putting them on the pudding. See? Just a little creativity and boom! Yummy dessert!

Okay, but this time I’ll share the recipe for what I made with my leftovers.

Banana Pudding from Leftovers

Banana custard:

1/2 egg (about 27 g)

1/2 tbsp cornstarch

130 g banana milk (cimory), warm

5 g sugar (more if you use plain milk)

Splash of vanilla

Langkah-langkah:

1. Heat the milk until warm

2. Beat egg and sugar until the sugar dissolves, add cornstarch and mix

3. Add the warm milk slowly to the egg mixture to temper the eggs then pour everything back in a sauce pan and cook until thickened. 

4. Once it reaches boiling point, let it boil for about 30-60 secs

5. Transfer to a bowl and cover the surface with plastic, let chill in the fridge

20 pieces of bolpis crackers or almost stale biscuits

Banana, chopped

Leftover cream cheese frosting (about 1/2-3/4 cup)

1. Fold the cooled custard to the leftover cream cheese frosting

2. In a small loaf pan add a thin layer of the pudding, then assemble the cookies, then add another thin layer of pudding, then place the sliced bananas, add the pudding, cookies then the rest of the pudding. Sprinkle the top with cookie crumbs

3. Let it chill in the fridge for at least 3 hours to let the crackers/biscuits soften