Banana Cream Pie
Why I Love This Recipe
Note: You will need: 1 pie plate, 1 medium mixing bowl, 1 cereal bowl for melting butter, a wire whisk or fork for whipping, a butter knife, tablespoon and plastic wrap.
Ingredients You'll Need
Crust
1 sleeve of graham crackers (any kind)
1 stick of butter
Filling
1 small 3.5-ounce box vanilla instant pudding
1 3/4 cup cold milk
1 medium banana
1 8-ounce container Cool Whip (any brand or fat preference)
Directions
Directions:
1. In your medium-sized mixing bowl, crumble all of the graham crackers with your hands, and then crush them some more by pressing the back of your tablespoon onto them until they're like breadcrumbs. Put one tablespoon of the dry crumbs aside on a paper towel or napkin for decoration on top of the pie at the end.
2. Melt your stick of butter in a microwave-safe cereal bowl in the microwave for 50 seconds. Let it sit in the microwave for a minute to cool down before you take it out.
3. Take the melted butter out of the microwave, and mix it into the graham cracker crumbs until they are completely combined. Put the empty cereal bowl in the sink.
4. Pour the graham cracker/butter mixture into your pie plate and begin to spread it out evenly as you gently press it to the bottom and sides to make a crust. Set aside and begin the filling.
5. Rinse out the bowl that you used for the graham cracker crumbs.
6. In the medium mixing bowl, whip together with your whisk or fork the instant pudding mix and 1 3/4 cup milk for 2-3 minutes. It will begin to get thicker after about the first minute.
Note: There's a difference between stirring and whipping. Stirring is like drawing flat circles around and around to blend things together. Whipping gives your ingredients some air and makes them fluffy. With your fork or whisk on a slant, you just quickly make circles over and over away from you, like you're cranking up a jack in the box. It's how you mix scrambled eggs, too!
7. Pour the pudding mix into your piecrust and spread it out evenly.
8. With your butter knife, slice up your banana the way pepperoni is sliced, but thicker. Don't slice your banana ahead of time, because it will start to turn brown by the time you're ready for it -- you know how bananas are!
9. Arrange the banana slices all over the pudding the way you would put pepperoni on a pizza. Go back to each banana slice and push them into the pudding like quicksand. Take your butter knife and smooth the pudding over the banana slices so that none of them are showing.
10. Cover the pie with plastic wrap and put it in the refrigerator for an hour.
11. Take the chilled pie out of the fridge and remove the plastic wrap.
12. Empty the thawed container of Cool Whip on top of the pie and spread it out evenly so that you can't see any of the pudding part.
13. Take the dry graham cracker crumbs that you put aside at the beginning, and sprinkle on top of the pie.
14. Serve and eat the pie!
