1: Brush the butter into 4 x 250ml dishes. Dust lightly with plain flour and shake out any excess.

2: Pour the rum and water into a saucepan. Bring to the boil, remove from the heat and add the bicarb and dates. Pop a lid on the pan and leave for 10-15 minutes or until the dates soak up the liquid and cool down.

3: Heat oven to 160c fan.

4: Pour the dates and the liquid into a bowl and add the flour, suet, sugar, vanilla and eggs. Beat until completely mixed, and spoon into the prepared oven proof dishes.

5: Bake for 30-35 minutes.

6: Meanwhile place the cream, sugar, butter and a small pinch of salt in a saucepan. Bring to the boil and simmer for 2-3 minutes and then remove from the heat.

7: Remove the puddings from the oven and arrange slices of the banana around the outer rim of each dish. Sprinkle the bananas liberally with Demerara sugar and run a blow torch over the bananas until the sugar caramelises.

8: Serve the puddings onto plates with a jug of toffee sauce on the side.