Nun Bananas in Coconut Milk

In Thailand, Buddhist monks wear robes the color of pumpkin, but Buddhist nuns wear robes as white as freshly grated coconut. This homey snack of banana chunks “enrobed” in a sauce of warm sweet coconut milk goes by the whimsical name of gluay buat chee, or “bananas ordained as nuns.”

Thai soil nourishes numerous varieties of bananas, some considered ideal for fritters, others for stewing with sticky rice for banana leaf–wrapped puddings, and still others for preserving in sugar syr