My next recipe comes from Lorraine Pascale’s Fast, Fresh and Easy Food. Letter ‘D’ was quite a difficult one for me, I looked through so many books, with the main ingredient in most of the recipes being ‘Date’. I think it probably took me at least an hour to find this recipe – yes, I really do have a huge amount of baking books, I actually have a whole bookcase full – 5 shelves in total and numerous others stacked up high on the floor. I just can’t resist them when I go shopping. Some people love shopping for clothes and shoes etc, I love shopping for baking items and books!
My family love banana cake, so this looked as though it should be good and it shouldn’t take too long to make as it was a traybake. Again, I’ve adapted it slightly in order to use ingredients up that I already have in my store cupboard.
Ingredients
Sticky Topping
- 50g butter
- 50g soft light brown sugar
Sponge
- 150g soft butter
- 175g soft light brown sugar
- 4 large eggs
- 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
- 175g self-raising flour
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 2 tsp ground cinnamon
- 1 tbsp golden syrup
- 2 small ripe bananas
Method
- Preheat the oven to 180C, Fan 160C, 350F, Gas Mark 4. Grease and line a 20cm square cake tin.
- Sticky topping – put the butter and soft light brown sugar in a small pan and place over a medium heat. Allow the butter to melt and then turn up the heat and let the mixture bubble away for a couple of minutes, stirring frequently, until it thickens slightly.
- Pour the mixture into the tin and spread it over the bottom. The easiest way to do this is to tip the tin back and forth.
- For the sponge mixture cream together the butter and the sugar until it is light and fluffy. Add the eggs one at a time beating the mixture between each addition. You may need to add a spoonful of flour after each egg to prevent the mixture from curdling. Add the vanilla extract and mix thoroughly. Fold in the flour, baking powder, cinnamon and golden syrup.
- Peel the bananas and slice them into 5mm thick pieces. Arrange the bananas in a single layer over the bottom of the baking tin. Pack them in tightly.
- Carefully spoon the cake mixture over the bananas and gently spread it out, so not to disturb the bananas. Level the top and place in the oven for 35-40 minutes.
- Once the cake is baked remove it from the oven and leave it to cool in the tin for approximately 10 minutes.
- Place a large plate on top of the cake and flip the tin and plate over. Carefully remove the tin and peel off the greaseproof paper to reveal the sticky dulce and bananas underneath.
- Cut into squares and serve either warm or cold with cream, custard or ice cream.
This cake actually improved with age (obviously only a day or two) the banana flavour became more enhanced the longer it was left. I was surprised that my husband really liked this cake, but my son wasn’t too keen as he absolutely loves banana cake. He wasn’t that keen on the Dulce on the top. He said it was too sweet. If I made it again, I think I would add another teaspoon full of cinnamon, as you couldn’t really taste it.
Self Raising Flower 