Imposter Pud: Salted Caramel Banoffee Trifle

Let me start by saying just how much I hate traditional trifle.

I won't bore you with the details. I'm guessing you probably loathe the stuff too.

Soggy, sherry soaked biscuits smothered in overly sweet, fake tasting jelly topped with crappy custard and watery cream.

I think it's only fair we give the old goat a make-over just in time for the weekend.

What do you think?

Sure, it's got custard, a fruit element, hits of booze and it's smothered with cream, but this is a new take on an old classic with a really nice twist.

I've whipped them up for countless dinner parties over the years and I think I've finally got the recipe down to a T

...rifle. Sorry.

To make a pud big enough for 6-8 guests, you're going to need:

2 packs of Lady Fingers (also known as savoiardi biscuits)

5 tablespoons dark rum

5 tablespoons good quality maple syrup

2 tins Carnation Caramel

1 teaspoon Maldon sea salt flakes

4 ripe bananas

Bird's instant custard powder. I'd definitely recommend this over ready made custards. As tempting as they might be, they don't set well and make the trifle very liquidy (technical term). Otherwise, feel free to make your own from scratch if you're that way inclined!

300g double cream

100g walnuts

40g golden caster sugar

1 tablespoon butter

A chunk of dark chocolate, grated for decoration

Firstly, get your custard on the go. Whip it up according to the packet instructions, adding milk and heating on the hob without over stirring as you go.

When it's ready, pop it in the fridge to cool it's jiggly little self down.

Boring bit done, grab the rest of your ingredients.

Stir together your syrup and rum. One by one, dunk your biscuits in the bowl for a couple of seconds on each side, you don't want them soggy, just nicely coated.

Lay them out in a large trifle bowl in one flat layer, squishing them down as you go.

Pour over any leftover liquid and slice up your bananas in long, diagonal slithers.

Spread them out over your biscuits and grab your cans of caramel.

In a bowl, combine with the salt and stir. Have a taste and see what you think. Too much will ruin the flavour, you just want little hits of saltiness dotted about here and there.

Once you're salt-isfied, glug your sweet, salty gloop over the bananas and spread!

Coooor, look at those layers! Makes you want to lick the screen doesn't it.

Go ahead, nobody's watching, I won't judge you, I'm an avid screen licker in private too but that's just between us.

Go fetch your cooled custard from the fridge and spread it out over the caramel.

You should have something that looks a little bit like this:

Pop everything back in the fridge and whilst your layers are getting well acquainted, turn the oven up to 200.

Place your walnuts in a baking tray and leave them to toast for ten minutes. Meanwhile, make your toffee candy coating.

This bit requires a beady little eye and a stroke of luck.

Too hot and your toffee will burn. Too cold and your toffee falls flat. On a low heat, slowly simmer the 90ml water with the sugar until it completely dissolves. Don't be tempted to stir it at this point, just be on the lookout, scout.

Add the butter, a pinch of salt and turn up the heat. You want your toffee thick and brown, so after a few minutes of boiling away, it should be ready.

Turn off the heat and grab yo' nuts!

Pour them into the toffee and stir well. Once they're good and coated, lay them out on a sheet of baking paper until you're ready to serve.

The trifle needs an hour or so to chill, but depending on dinner deadlines you can keep it there for as long as you wish. I sometimes even leave mine overnight if I'm being an organised little cook and it comes out just fine.

Either way, whip your cream just before serving up and spread over the chilly trifle.

Top with your crunchy, candied walnuts.

And finely grate over a little chunk of dark chocolate to finish things off.

Take your pud to the table and prepare for some top button popping "oooohs!" and "ahhhhhs!" from your dinner guests.

If they weren't already madly in love with you, you've just bagged yourself some brand new admirers.

A Very Merry Shutterbug Christmas

I've had a whirlwind Christmas break. And thanks to my dear old friend Santa Claus, I got to capture it all on camera with my brand new snapper!

I found my Lumix GF5 beneath the Christmas tree with a big, fat, red bow on it.

But lets rewind a couple of days. I kicked off the holidays flying to Edinburgh on a windy Christmas Eve. I woke at 3am to find that The Boy had booked the wrong flights, (an all to familiar occurrence) before skyscanning like a manic to find the correct ones.

Three hours later and I was giggling in the kitchen with my Mother and Gordon.

The whole family had made their way to up north and we laughed, drank and ate ourselves silly before hitting the hay. When we awoke, it was Christmas day!

We opened bundles of presents and toasted champagne before getting to work in the kitchen. I whipped up a Boozy Salted Caramel and Banana Trifle and my Ultimate Triple Chocolate Christmas Cake, whilst mum basted turkey and roasted potatoes until she was blue in the face.

With that good 'n' done, we got down to some serious eating.

And in true Christmas spirit, out came the Jagermeister and board games. I don't think you need to see photographic evidence of the state we ended up in, so instead, here's a picture of Boxing Day cauliflower cheese!

And its various decadent accompaniments.

Me and The Boy made our way back to London that evening and filled our delay time bottles of pink lemonade and sugar induced silly selfies.

The next four days included Christmas Day Round's 2, 3 and 4, starting with The Boy's mums house.

Which of course, gave me the chance to take bazillions of photo's of Baby K.

And open even more presents!

Check it out - a super swish Pancake Lens for the snapper. It's ever so dreamy.

We feasted on turkey and gammon sandwiches before taking to the sofa and slobbing out for the evening in our favourite festive jumpers.

And giving the little one a social media masterclass, of course.

Next up was Christmas Round 3 at my Dad's house with my sister and M. We drank even more bubbles had a light lunch with my Nan and Grandad.

Needless to say, I didn't go for the turkey. The Boy took on the Big Burger Challenge to win a spot on the Wall of Flame and failed miserably.

His mission was to plough through two huge beef burgers, chicken breasts lathered in cheese and BBQ sauce, a double serving of criss-cross fries and a mound of big old greasy onion rings in 30 minutes.

After three days of constant eating, it was never going to end well.

The following day we drove down to the countryside to visit more of The Boy's family. The whole gang huddled under the Christmas tree where we exchanged the last of our presents and celebrated the New Year. Even Lola and Louis had a little something from the elves!

This one's all mine though. Sorry, kitty cats.

We made our way to the kitchen for our last festive feast courtesy of Caroline.

And a few too many sloe vodka and champagne cocktails, courtesy of Mark.

To help dinner go down, the annual Ward Reindeer Cracker Racing Match commenced.

I put my money on this handsome looking little chap.

 But things soon got a little competitive and Dancer lost his dancing feet.

After a few 'questionable' tactics, Litto came out on top.

We settled down with big bowls of trifle and French coffees and chatted until the early hours of the morning.

The perfect ending to one of my most favourite Christmases to date.

I was pretty busy this year, huh? You won't be surprised to hear that I spent my New Years Eve cuddled up in a cinema watching The Hunger Games in my most favourite fleecy joggers. 

I hope you had a great Christmas and kicked off the New Year in a slightly more glamourous fashion than I did. It's back to work for me in the morning... Anyone else dreading rejoining the real world?