Pour the milk into a saucepan and bring the milk slowly up to boiling point. Place the vanilla bean pod into the milk and leave it to infuse for about 20 minutes.

In a bowl, beat and mix together the egg yolks and sugar until thick. Carefully remove the vanilla bean pod from the pan of milk and scrape out the seeds into the milk. Pour a thin stream of the milk mixture into the egg yolk mixture while stirring. Add about one cup of the hot milk to the egg mixture being careful not to pour to fast or you will curdle your custard. Pour the mixture back into the pan and heat gently, stirring until the custard thickens and coats the back of a wooden spoon. Do not bring to a boil. Strain into bowl, and refrigerate until very cold. When the custard base has cooled, stir in the heavy cream.

For Bananas Foster mixture: (I made 1 1/2 times this part of the recipe so I would have some to pour over the cake and ice cream when plated). Melt the butter in a skillet. Add the brown sugar, cinnamon and stir to mix. Heat for a few minutes. Then place the banana slices into the sauce and saute until soft and lightly browned. Add the rum and allow it to heat well, then tip the pan so that the flame causes the sauce to ignite or touch it with a match. Allow the sauce to flame until it goes out. Cool to room temperature and then chill along with the custard mixture.

When both the custard mixture and the Bananas Foster mixture are very cold, mix these together. Pour into your ice cream maker and freeze according to your makers directions.

I served this with medallions of chocolate cake (two to a stack) with extra Banana Foster sauce on the side. With or without the cake, it is delicious.