MouthLondon - London Student & Youth Magazine
Recipes: Fried Peanut Butter & Banana Sandwich
Pin ItAt first, this sandwich seems like a comically disgusting and quintessentially American combination – something that might appear on Man v. Food. It is something which has to be eaten to be believed: the bread delicately crisps in the hot butter, each mouthful yielding with a gentle crunch. The combination of peanut butter and banana is harmoniously salty-sweet, creamy, and vanilla-scented.
This sandwich comes together within minutes and is delicious, filling, and comforting, something you want to apply to your face in order to soak up a hangover or send away hunger pangs. It’s really no wonder that this was reputedly one of Elvis’s favourite things to eat.
…I shared half a sandwich with my boyfriend…
A healthier version involves just toasting the bread rather than frying the whole sandwich. You could also use brown bread. On the other hand, you can also add a drizzle of honey and crisp slices of fried streaky bacon to the filling and increase the salty-sweet flavour contrast.
The amount given here is for one sandwich, which is plenty for one person; I shared half a sandwich with my boyfriend and we both felt we could have gone for another slice. It’s up to you whether you want to pile them high and go into YouTube food challenge territory.
Slightly adapted from Nigella Lawson’s ‘Nigella Bites’
Ingredients
- . 2 slices of white Bread
- . 1 small to medium sized ripe Banana (or half of a huge one)
- . Approximately 2 tablespoons smooth Peanut Butter
- . 2 tablespoons Butter
Instructions
- In a small bowl, mash the banana into a paste. Spread this evenly on one slice of bread.
- On the other slice of the bread, dollop over and spread the peanut butter. Carefully sandwich the bread slices together. Get your plate ready.
- Heat a smallish frying pan over a medium flame. Hold your hand a few inches above the pan: when you can feel the heat coming off the pan, add all of the butter.
- Once the butter has stopped foaming and sizzling, carefully place the sandwich in the pan. Fry for half a minute or so on each side until it starts to smell good and is crisp and brown. Gently turn with tongs or a spatula.
- When it’s done, lift onto your plate, cut in half and enjoy.
About the author
I'm a self-conscious dilettante with a degree in History of Art from SOAS and UCL. I've lived in Greater London all my life, interrupted only occasionally by brief trips to Thailand. The result is that I speak Thai with a Croydon accent (and sometimes Croydon with a posh accent, but that's another story). Far from being a charming bilingual intellectual of the world who ably holds forth on every topic imaginable at dinner parties, most of what I actually say in either language is "Hello", "That's a nice painting", and "I'm hungry". My idea of a balanced diet is a bowl of Mama instant noodles in one hand and a chip buttie in the other, but I also don't mind a nice bit of duck confit or gaeng paa gai. I don't go to dinner parties, anyway. I like looking at interesting things. Thai contemporary art, Early Modern English portraiture, and lowbrow art have so far held my attention. I consume vast amounts of art and food, so I thought I would give something back by writing.
Further articles by Pear Nuallak →
Leave a response for ‘Recipes: Fried Peanut Butter & Banana Sandwich’
All fields marked with an asterisk (*) are required. Your email address is confidential and will not be published on this site or passed onto any third parties.
By submitting a comment, you grant this site a perpetual license to reproduce your words and name and/or website in attribution. All comments are moderated before being published.