Grilled Bananas Wrapped with Sweet Rice

Grilled bananas with sticky rice is a rustic dish often sold on the streets of Vietnam. In a newspaper article on tourism, this dish has been on a list of delicious dishes. Personally, I have very happy memories of this snack. As a student, I had three very close female friends. We often ate snacks during after-school sessions. We four kids loved the same dish – (Chuối Nếp Nướng) grilled sticky banana. We had set out a game rule, and the rule was that the one of the four of us that ate less than the others, then that person had to pay for the others’ food. Normally, I did not eat as much as my friends, and I usually lost the game although I still remember that I was once close to finishing three of the grilled bananas. No wonder, I used to look quite stout and chubby as a teenager. However, this dish was chosen for the best snack food on the street because it has the natural sweetness of the bananas, blended with sticky sweet rice, and with the creaminess of coconut milk. The fragrance was unbelievable while waiting for them to be served because in Vietnam this dish was grilled using a stove made with clay. This kind of clay pot was just used for grilling this banana dish. While watching a cook finish grilling bananas, the clicking sound of the charcoal and watching the  flame-broil the bananas leaf wrapping around the  sticky rice, created a hungry feeling that increased one’s appetite way up. I still remember a first bite into this bananas between my teeth. A naturally sweet juice from the banana flowed out, and oh boy! All the worry and weariness of the day washed away. After 1975, Saigon, the capital of South Vietnam, was taken over by the Communists from the North.  We all lost contact with each other and are perhaps now living somewhere on the globe. I am certain that all my friends still remember this silly game that we played and now miss this dish and those wonderful memories. Today, I will prepare this Chuối Nếp Nướng dish to recall the taste of food from my childhood and to relive fond memories of my best friends of my youth that I adore very much. 
 
Ingredients:
2 cups sweet rice, washed and drained
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup coconut milk (from 14 oz. can)
1 cup water
1/4 cup sugar or less
4 bananas, cut in half
Banana leaves, washed and cut lengthwise (about 1 inch width)
 Coconut milk for topping
1 cup coconut milk
1/3 cup water
2 tbs sugar
1/2 tsp salt
1 tbs cornstarch
2 tbs water 
Roasted peanuts
 
Directions:
Combine sweet rice, salt, coconut milk, and water in a rice cooker. Press to cook. When rice is cooked, add sugar and mix well. 

Cut a plastic wrap three times bigger than each banana. Place on countertop. While working close in front of you, place 1/3 cup of cooked rice on the center of a piece of plastic wrap.

 Cover the rice with the extra plastic wrap hanging over. Use your hands or a pin to roll the cooked rice large enough to wrap around a banana. Uncover the plastic wrap and place banana in the middle of the now flattened cooked rice.

Start rolling up, making sure the entire banana is covered by cooked rice.

Wrap the rice-covered banana with a banana leaf (follow the picture).

Place seam side down on a baking sheet.

Preheat oven to 450° and first bake the bananas for 15 minutes and then turn the oven to broil. Let bananas broil on all sides. 

White the bananas are baking, make coconut milk.
In a sauté pan, add the coconut ingredients, except the cornstarch, and water to just simmer. Dissolve the cornstarch in water. Add to the coconut milk and cook until thick.

Peel off the banana leaf and place bananas on a serving plate. Top with coconut milk and roasted peanuts.
Note – this dish can be stored frozen in the freezer for later consumption.