TikTok is my new obsession for quick recipes. The one I’m about to cover is a doozy.
First, I made it for the taste test, of course. Later that day, I made it a second time for the purposes of additional photos. It’s so important to get the right lighting, you know. Naturally, I made it a third time so my family could try it. I may have had a bite or two, just for the purposes of sound data collection (scientific method and all). And then I made it a fourth time for the purposes of breakfast on Sunday morning, because, friends, it is a religious experience.
Jen Jones used to be a singer, until the pandemic hit the entertainment industry especially hard. In asking herself what else she could do, she turned to another love: food. She has been cooking since she was a child and has always had a knack for it: “I just know what goes together,” she said. Several family members have had health problems requiring dietary changes, so she started making forays into plant-based eating, and after noticing improvements in her own health, she has transitioned to a plant-based diet entirely over the last 18 months.
All along the way, she’s been uploading her efforts to her TikTok and Instagram hoping to help others interested in trying a plant-based diet. “I wake up, I’m thinking about recipes. I go crazy thinking about recipes all day. I go to bed thinking about recipes!" she said, adding that she hopes her videos will empower people to prioritize their own health. "I just know it’s my purpose, part of my own journey, to help people."
I agree she just knows what flavors go together, but her ideas are refreshingly novel at the same time. I’ve never seen anything like her brilliant red pepper pineapple juice before. Some of her recipes really are healthy, too; I get irritated with ultra-processed ingredients and chemical additives masquerading as good nutrition, but there’s not much along those lines here. She says the most popular things on her social media are the fruit-veggie juices and the sweets, and it’s easy to see why; I’m excited to make several of her recipes myself.
Enter the air-fryer banana split, made to be day 14 of a 31-day plant-based challenge, and happy recipient of over 3 million views on TikTok since it was posted in January. I know what you’re thinking: Hot ice cream does not compute. Try it, though, and you’ll understand what she’s getting at.
There are lots of wonderful air-fryer banana recipes online, but most are just sliced and caramelized. (Pro tip: line your air fryer with foil unless you love scrubbing out burned sugar.) Cooked bananas may sound odd at first blush, but maybe you’ve had bananas Foster before, and bananacue (a portmanteau of banana and barbecue) has been a staple of Filipino street food cooking for decades. This banana split recipe is different, though.
First, Jones cuts a slit in an unpeeled banana, but not the way other air-fried banana recipes do it; she rests it on its side and cuts a slit in the side facing up, leaving the bottom side of the peel intact like a hot dog bun. She opens it out a bit, fills it with natural peanut butter, dark chocolate and walnut halves and air fries at 400 F for five to six minutes. Then she tops it with cinnamon and plant-based yogurt (she suggests Cocojune coconut yogurt). She says her reaction on the TikTok is real, her first taste of her own new recipe, and I think I made the same face when I tried it myself.
Let’s fry it up, and I’ll show you!
I suggest using a fully ripe banana with a few brown dots. We’ve got nut allergies in the house, so I made mine with no-sugar-added sunflower butter, dark chocolate chips and pumpkin seeds, but the peanut butter and walnuts Jones used, or any nut along with almond, pumpkin seed or even chickpea butter would all work well.
Start your air fryer preheating while preparing the banana. Wedging the two sides apart with a spoon makes it easier to stuff the toppings in there more easily. All you’ll need is about a tablespoon of each.
I took at look at it after five minutes, and since the pumpkin seeds weren’t burning, I decided to go for the extra minute for caramelization reasons. The banana softens up a lot in that last minute, so stop at 4 or 5 minutes if you’d like it less so.
For topping, I happened to have coffee Chobani Greek yogurt on hand. I also tried one with a little strawberry jam in it to heighten the banana split effect.
The verdict? Sublime.
It’s hot, yes, but the cold yogurt contributes to the impression of an ice cream treat. With all the toppings, the creamy textures, the sweetness and the temperature contrasts, it’s sort of the inverse of a hot fudge banana split. It will depend a lot on the nut butter and yogurt you use, but typically, this recipe will clock in under 350 calories. The average ice cream shop banana split has at least 800.
Some of the people I shared it with were not crazy about the color change the peel undergoes within the first minute of heating (I’m not naming any names, but his initials are “my husband”), but I think it’s striking and beautiful, like forbidden rice or Moon Drop grapes. People who hate overripe bananas may understandably feel the color is off-putting, though. If you’d prefer, it’s absolutely possible to separate the skin from the banana a little bit both before and after cooking, and then you can sort of finesse it off the skin and onto the plate with your spoon before topping with yogurt.
Jones says the reaction has been almost universally positive, but her air-fried orange from day 13 got even more love, with 6.7 million views. Her own favorite is her "paradise on a plate" air-fried pineapple. If you’re considering adding some plant-based meals and snacks to your repertoire, Jones encourages you to start with recipes that use your favorite ingredients and then make changes gradually. "It might take six months, it might take three years," she said, "but it doesn’t matter as long as you’re trying. Everybody has their own journey."
Next up for me are her healthy ice cream sandwiches and pasta chips (a trend TODAY covered last summer). As for what’s next for Jones, she doesn’t do anything small, so hold onto your hats. She has a skin care business with a coffee oil treatment she developed herself, and more in the works, like a body scrub. There’s a new wellness blog. She has cookbooks available for download (a series of four seasonal editions called "So Easy & So Good") and a YouTube channel. And of course, you can always find her quick and simple plant-based recipes on her TikTok.
My own prediction? She loves Ceylon cinnamon and has an adorably trademarkable way of saying it. I foresee a Jen Jones Ceylon CIN-na-MEIN! sprinkle, healthy and all-natural of course, with a classy label and a suggestion to put it on literally everything.
Some smart spice company had better snap that up. I think she might be going places.