This shockingly easy banoffee pie recipe combines a crunchy graham cracker crust, soft and sweet dulce de leche, thick slices of fresh banana, and a mountain of billowy whipped cream. Everyone who tries a slice is instantly hooked.
My team and I love all things pie and we’ve worked hard to develop a slew of new recipes over the years, especially around the holiday seasons. Here are some favorites:
- Sweet Potato Pie & Pumpkin Pie
- Nutella Tart
- Pecan Pie Bars
- Apple Pie & Apple Cranberry Pie
- Caramel Pear Pie
- Pecan Pie & Chocolate Pecan Pie
For even more inspiration, here are all of our favorite Thanksgiving pie recipes. But today, I’m showing you how I make banoffee pie:
What Is Banoffee Pie?
A popular English dessert, banoffee = bananas + toffee. A rich combination of different textures and flavors, banoffee pie combines a cookie/biscuit or graham cracker crust with silky dulce de leche, bananas, and homemade whipped cream. I normally have impeccable self control around all the desserts I bake, but I literally could not put down my fork with this pie. Between the soft, crunchy, creamy, gooey, and sweet—there’s no denying banoffee pie’s allure. You’ll be hooked.
Adding to its appeal, banoffee pie is the EASIEST pie you’ll ever make. The 3-ingredient graham cracker crust is pre-baked, but that’s all the oven time required. Just like in strawberry cream cheese pie, baking the crust makes the whole pie more sturdy. Layer the remaining ingredients on top, then refrigerate until ready to dig in. That’s it!
Instead of graham crackers, this pie is also fantastic with a Biscoff pie crust.
What Is Dulce de Leche?
Dulce de leche is similar to caramel, but a little sweeter and creamier. It’s prepared by slowly heating sugar and milk until everything caramelizes. If we’re getting all scientific, I learned that a lot of the flavor comes from the Maillard reaction. Interesting! Dulce de leche is Spanish for candy made/of milk. There are a few ways to prepare dulce de leche including:
- The classic method of cooking down and constantly stirring milk and sugar
- The shortcut method of cooking sweetened condensed milk
We’re using the shortcut method today, but I included a link to a classic dulce de leche recipe in the recipe notes. Both are delicious!
Dulce de Leche Made From Sweetened Condensed Milk
There are a couple ways you can make dulce de leche from a can of sweetened condensed milk. You can boil it—the actual closed can—in a pot of water for a couple hours or you can pour the sweetened condensed milk in a pie dish and bake it in a water bath. I prefer the oven method because I’ve heard some pretty scary stories about the hot cans bursting open after boiling for so long. Items you need:
- large roasting pan
- pie dish
- 1 can of sweetened condensed milk
- aluminum foil
Instructions:
- Pour the sweetened condensed milk in a pie dish.
- Place the pie dish in a large roasting pan and place the roasting pan in the oven.
- Fill the roasting pan with enough HOT water until it reaches halfway up the pie dish. This is exactly what we do when we bake cheesecake.
- Loosely cover the pie dish with aluminum foil.
- Heat oven to 350°F (177°C).
- Bake until sweetened condensed milk has thickened and caramelized, about 2 hours. Add more hot water after 1 hour, since some of it has evaporated.
All of the “work” is hands-off. After 2 hours, the sweetened condensed milk has turned into golden dulce de leche. Magic. Let the dulce de leche cool, then pour into your pre-baked graham cracker crust. You can make the dulce de leche up to 2 weeks in advance.
After that, we have a layer of banana slices. Make sure you use nice yellow bananas and save mushy spotty bananas for recipes like banana bread and banana muffins.
Have you ever had caramel and banana before? This pie is exactly that, but better. A voluminous mountain of soft homemade whipped cream is the finishing touch! Piled high, this creamy layer balances out all the other textures and flavors in this completely irresistible pie.
Banoffee pie is so simple that you’ll feel like you’re doing something wrong. You’re not—it really is this easy. If pie crust isn’t your thing, banoffee pie is!
For even more delicious flavor combinations with bananas, you’ll want to try this peanut butter banana cream pie next.
This recipe is part of Sally’s Pie Week, an annual tradition where I share a handful of new recipes that fit into the pie/crisp/tart category. Join the community below!
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Banoffee Pie
- Prep Time: 20 minutes
- Cook Time: 15 minutes
- Total Time: 3 hours, 35 minutes
- Yield: 8-10 servings
- Category: Pie
- Method: Baking
- Cuisine: American
Description
This shockingly easy banoffee pie combines a crunchy graham cracker crust, soft and sweet dulce de leche, thick slices of fresh banana, and a mountain of billowy whipped cream. Everyone who tries a slice is instantly hooked.
Ingredients
- 1 and 1/2 cups (180g) graham cracker crumbs (about 12 full sheet graham crackers)
- 1/4 cup (50g) granulated sugar
- 6 Tablespoons (85g) unsalted butter, melted
- 1 and 1/4 cups dulce de leche**
- 2 large bananas, sliced
Whipped Cream
- 2 cups (480ml) cold heavy cream or heavy whipping cream
- 1/4 cup confectioners’ sugar or granulated sugar*
- 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
- optional toppings: chocolate shavings, chopped nuts, or toffee bits for garnish
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350°F (177°C).
- Make the crust: If you’re starting out with full graham crackers, use a food processor or blender to grind them into fine crumbs. Stir the graham cracker crumbs and granulated sugar together in a medium bowl, and then stir in the melted butter. The mixture will be thick, coarse, and sandy. Try to smash/break up any large chunks. Pour the mixture into an ungreased 9-inch pie dish. With medium pressure using your hand, pat the crumbs down into the bottom and up the sides to make a compact crust. Do not pack down with heavy force because that makes the crust too hard. Simply pat down until the mixture is no longer crumby/crumbly. Tips: You can use a small flat-bottomed measuring cup to help press down the bottom crust and smooth out the surface, but do not pack down too hard. And run a spoon around the bottom “corner” where the edge and bottom meet to help make a rounded crust—this helps prevent the crust from falling apart. For more shaping technique tips, see the graham cracker crust recipe page.
- Bake the crust for 15 minutes. Cool for 15 minutes.
- For the whipped cream: Using a hand mixer or a stand mixer fitted with a whisk attachment, whip the heavy cream, sugar, and vanilla extract on medium-high speed until medium peaks form, about 3-4 minutes. Medium peaks are between soft/loose peaks and stiff peaks and are the perfect consistency for topping and piping on desserts.
- Spread dulce de leche on top of the crust. Arrange banana slices in 1–2 layers on top of the dulce de leche, then spread whipped cream on top.
- Refrigerate pie uncovered for at least 2 hours and up to 1 day. Garnish with toppings before serving, if desired.
- Cover and store leftover pie in the refrigerator for up to 5 days.
Notes
- Make Ahead Instructions: Cover the baked and cooled graham cracker crust tightly and store in the refrigerator for up to 2 days or freeze for up to 3 months. Thaw in the refrigerator before using. Dulce de leche, instructions below, can be made up to 2 weeks in advance. Cover tightly and store in the refrigerator. The fully assembled pie can be prepared up to 1 day in advance. Store uncovered in the refrigerator until ready to serve. I don’t recommend freezing the prepared banoffee pie because it doesn’t thaw very nicely, but you can certainly freeze any leftover slices for up to 3 months.
- Special Tools (affiliate links): Food Processor | Glass Mixing Bowl | 9-inch Pie Dish | Electric Mixer (Handheld or Stand)
- Dulce de Leche: You can use store-bought dulce de leche, but I recommend making it at home. You can make it completely from scratch or use 1 (standard 14-ounce/397g) can of sweetened condensed milk. Instructions: Pour the sweetened condensed milk in a pie dish. Place the pie dish in a large roasting pan and place the roasting pan in the oven. Fill the roasting pan with enough HOT water until it reaches halfway up the pie dish. Loosely cover the pie dish with aluminum foil. Heat oven to 350°F (177°C). Bake until sweetened condensed milk has thickened and caramelized, about 2 hours. Add more hot water to the roasting pan after 1 hour, since some of it has evaporated. After 2 hours, the sweetened condensed milk has turned into golden dulce de leche. (If not, continue to bake.) Let the dulce de leche cool, then pour into your pre-baked graham cracker crust. You can make the dulce de leche up to 2 weeks in advance.
- Bananas Browning: Though I haven’t experienced the bananas browning underneath the whipped cream, you can certainly squeeze a few drops of fresh lemon juice all over the banana slices before layering them into the pie. This keeps the banana slices fresh, especially if you’re making the pie a day in advance. With a small amount of juice, you won’t detect the lemon flavor.
- Non-US Readers: If graham crackers are not available where you live, we have also tested this pie with a crust made from digestive biscuits, and it turned out great. Use 200g ground digestive biscuit crumbs (about 2 cups; 13–14 biscuits), 1/3 cup (67g) granulated sugar, and 6 Tablespoons (85g) melted butter. Pre-bake the crust for a bit longer, about 16-17 minutes.
Reader Comments and Reviews
Hi, the link to make the “dulce de leche from scratch” is broken
The link is working fine on our end! You can copy and paste here and see if that works for you: https://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/alton-brown/dulce-de-leche-recipe-1948282
Hi , made this with digestives & it was delicious, everyone loved it. Now I would like to try it with Biscoff. Would it be 180 grams or 200 grams? Thanks Sujata
Hi Sujata, we’d recommend 180 grams of crushed Biscoff cookies.
I made this for the first time for my New Year’s dinner.
I used the store-bought dulce de leche. My pie was soupy. I refrigerated it over night and didn’t add the whipped cream until I served it.
This pie is so creamy and delicious!! All the different flavors go really well together. It was a hit on Thanksgiving with family so I made it again on Christmas! I am sure this will be an all time favorite that will be repeated. Thank you Sally.
Deb
Easy way to make dulce de leche – split two cans of sweetened condensed milk between three jars with tight lids and screw the lids down tight. Put the jars on their sides in your slow cooker, cover with water so that the jars are completely immersed, then cook on low for 8-10 hours. It gets a bit darker the longer you leave it. Yummy!
Hi!Love your site! My son had Banoffe Pie at a restaurant in Palm Beach Gardens, cafe Chardonay so I want to make it for thanksgiving! My question, after making the Dulce,do I freeze it in the pie crust im going to be using or do I just freeze the dulce? Thank you and Happy Thanksgiving!!!
Hi Darlene, we recommend freezing the pie crust and dulce de leche separately, then rewarming the dulce before spreading into the pie crust and assembling the entire pie. Hope it’s a hit!
So far so good. I’m still in process (cooling) but I would suggest checking your condensed milk after an hour. Mine took 1 hour and 20 mins. After looking at reviews I decided to check it and it was done! Stir it a bit to make sure it is thick and a darker colour and that it smells delicious .
This recipe was fantastic; easy to make and a huge crowd pleaser. Not too sweet and the balance of flavours between the dulce de leche, banana and whipped cream was perfect.
My crust unfortunately came out a bit crumbly so the pieces fell apart when serving. Not sure if I baked it too much or too little?
Hi Monique! The key to a great graham cracker crust is to really pack in the crumbs as tightly as you can so they’ll stay together. So glad you enjoyed this recipe!
This turned out really delicious. The flavor of the dulce de leche, banana, and whipped cream was perfectly balanced. My only complaint is that the whipped cream doesn’t hold very well; I found it started to deflate and run within just a few hours, so while the leftovers are delicious, they’re sort of weepy. Next time, I would probably make a stabilized whipped cream with cream cheese to top it instead. Otherwise, really delicious and probably the best graham cracker base I’ve ever had!
They have stabilizer you can buy it’s called whip it , I use it all the time and it stops the heavy cream from running . One envelope for 8 oz of cream . Can’t wait to try this recipe
you can use powdered gelatin to stabilize whipped cream as well . My apologies if you already knew that 😉 I definitely love your idea of the cream cheese with it as well. That bit of a zing from the cream cheese would counteract the sweetness of the dulce de leche perfectly. I am definitely going to try it.
I had a hard time slicing this into wedges, straight from the fridge, because of the weepy whipped cream and the very firm crust. It was messy. I like the flavor combinations but would maybe make it again in a banana pudding format to scoop into bowls
OMG…my new favorite pie! Truly incredible. It was my first time making dulce de leche (I used the water bath oven method – pretty easy cause you can just put it in and leave it for a few hours). But overall, this pie was pretty easy to make and incredibly delicious. Everyone was so impressed. The graham cracker crust can’t be beat.
I also found it was better once chilled in the fridge for a few hours!
Can you Fry the bananas in butter then put in the pie?
Hi Ash, We’ve never tried it but we don’t see why not. Let us know if you give it a try!
Can i caramelize the banana first!?
How would you soften/loosen the dulce de leche if you make it ahead of time?
Hi Dia, You should be able to gently reheat it to soften it back up. You can either use a microwave, stirring every 10-30 seconds, or in a double boiler on your stove.
SUPER DELICIOUS! My husband and I fought for the last slice- thank you for sharing!
I’ve made this a few times now and they’re really good. I only put half of the dulce de leche after the first one as we found it’s too sweet. The leftover we found other use for.
If you want a delicious topping for this pie, take two cups of your favorite homemade or store bought caramel and one very ripe banana. Combine in a blender until smooth. Banana caramel keeps well for seven days in the fridge.
Trina:
I have a family member allergic to bananas and latex but love the look of Dulce de Leche. I’ll definitely try it. Thank you for your quick response.
Janet
Hi, Sally. A huge fan of all your recipes and most of them turn out amazing. But like some others, I seemed to have messed up the dulce. I followed all your instructions, but the dulce turned out like flan, with a curdled consistency. Where did I go wrong and how can I fix it?
Hi Aish, It sounds like your dulce de leche was probably over cooked. Did you make it in the oven the way we describe in the oven notes? If you try it again keep your eye on it and remove it from the oven once it begins to thicken and takes on a darker color. Cooking it too long could solidify it to a flan like texture.
Hi, Sally. Thanks for the prompt reply. Yeah, I followed the instructions exactly as mentioned. But I’ll try cooking it for lesser time the next time. Thank you!
Can you substitute the bananas with another fruit? Strawberries–blueberries?
Hi Janet, you could certainly try it, though we love the flavor combination of bananas and dulce de leche. Here’s our other pie recipes if you’re interested in other fruit pies.
Hi
I followed the recipe to the letter on how to make the Dulce de Leche from Condensed Sweetened milk.
After 2 hours the color was perfect but the texture is weird
it is not creamy it is hard a bit like a flan
What went wrong?
Same thing happened to me. The texture is spongy. I was hoping it would get better by stirring but no. I don’t think we’ll be having pie today :/
Same spongy/lumpy consistency when I tried this method. I really wanted this method to be easier than stovetop, but it totally didn’t work for me.
Scoop it into parfait glasses and serve with ice cream.
Hi Sally
Can I omit the sugar in the crust? I think its sweet enough. Does the caramel get weepy, mine seemed solid at first but then kind of became loose. Any suggestions?
Hi Karen, you can certainly try omitting the sugar in the crust. However, keep in mind that the sugar helps bind the crust together so it may easily fall apart when slicing/serving. The dulce de leche layer isn’t solid– very soft and gooey, yes.
Hi! Can you cook more than one can of sweetened condensed milk at once to make enough dulce de leche for multiple pies?
Hi Laura, You could if you have a larger dish. It will likely take longer to properly cook, but I’m unsure of the exact time needed. Let us know if you try it!
Hi there! Could you recommend any other biscuits the I could use aside from Graham crackers? I live in Australia and I don’t get to see any Graham crackers in my usual grocery stores. Arnott’s biscuits are the ones readily available here.
Hi Amariah, Many readers outside of the US substitute digestive biscuits for graham crackers. Most lightly sweet crunchy cookie/biscuits should be ok. Let us know what you try.
Is it safe to use a Pyrex pie pan when making the dulce de leche or is a metal pan preferred?
Hi Diane, I usually use my Pyrex with no problem.
Hi 🙂
If I am making this pie today to eat tomorrow do you recommend waiting to put the whip cream on top-will that deflate or melt into the condensed milk? Any advice would be greatly appreciated 🙂
Hi Melanie, You can certainly store the whipped cream separately and top the pie just before serving. However, your fully assembled pie can be prepared up to 1 day in advance and stored uncovered in the refrigerator until ready to serve.
Hi Sally. I just made the dulche de leche and realized it had a few lumps. What would you recommend?
GoodDay Sally!
I was wondering if i could use your All Butter Pie Crust instead of the graham cracker crust here (i cannot get any in S.A), as i have the 2nd half disc leftover and i cant decide what to use with it.
I am using the 1st disc for the Coconut Cream Pie.
Can’t wait to try it!
Regards,
Ariffa.
Yes you can use that crust and follow the tips on the post for blind baking it. Enjoy!
Hi! Well, I’ve read through all the comments and I seem to be the only one that failed at making this pie and I’m trying to figure out what happened because I was so excited to try it! My pie was basically soup. I baked the graham cracker crust, let it cool for about a half hour, and then poured a can of dulce de leche over top of the crust. I added the bananas on top and then piped on the homemade whipped cream. I followed everything exactly as written. I’m thinking It had to have been the whipped cream.. it didn’t hold up? I did pipe it on.. got too warm? I I refrigerated it for approx 8 hours before “cutting” into it. It was inedible unfortunately. Any suggestions on what happened??
Hi Ashley, I’m just seeing your question now so my apologies for the delay responding. It sounds like the whipped cream could have gotten a little warm somewhere in the assembly process. Was your dulce de leche or pie crust still pretty warm at all? What method did you use for the dulce de leche? I wonder if it wasn’t thick enough.
Hi From Philippines here. omg! I loved this recipe so much. We call dulce de leche YEMA here and condensed milk has been in every sweet staple dish we have. Just had a problem with my Dulce De leche I was trying to achieve your brown caramel color mine didnt, and wasnt really that spreadable. I poured 2 tbsp of cold water so make it softer.
I have been your fan since last year and you are my inspiration. My first success was your Super Moist Carrot Cake recipe it was the BOMB!!! Everybody loved it! Thank you so much! ❤️
Hi Sally,
Eaglebrand is the most popular sweetened condensed milk brand we use in Canada. They now make a Dulce de Leche as well. You can find it in the sweetened condensed milk and evaporated milk area of the baking aisle in most grocery stores. Not sure why they didn’t come out with it before now but certainly saves a lot of time – safer than boiling sweetened condensed milk too 🙂
Hey Sally! I’m from Brazil and we eat a lot of Dulce de Leche. I want to share with you a common way to make it that it’s even easier. You just put the can of condensed milk (without opening it) in the pressure cooker for 30 min on low heat with enough water to cover the can. Let it cool down (very important step because you can burn yourself), better to do it the day before, and when you open the can you have Dulce de leche!
Thanks for the tip, Paola! That sounds a lot quicker and safer than the stovetop method as the pressure in the pressure cooker would neutralize the pressure in the can and, theoretically, prevent an explosion. I need to make this.
OMG- that is genius! It worked perfectly and so easy with no mess!
I made these as mini banoffee pies using the same recipe but in a regular muffin-pan. They were absolutely delicious and still a big hit, but I had to make the bases quite thick, otherwise they crumbled and didn’t hold together. Any tips on how to have thinner bases and prevent this from happening next time?