All 4 entries tagged Banana

Understudies in Nigella's Chocolate Banana Bread: Introducing Whiskey and Currants

I know this is a rather strange title for a recipe: this is another one of my cakes that appeared, as it were, from the magic created when the actors of a recipe are not there, one looks for the understudies and BOOM! the result is far better than the original. I say 'another' because it isn't the first time that I've improvised with ingredients whilst baking. My baking history is chequered with them, for example the courgette and walnut cake when my cupboard lacked most of the ingredients in and the carrot and pinenut cake that was created when I put baking powder in the wrong bowl of herman...

The smell of this banana cake, that I conjured up, is of Christmas. No wonder as I used sloe whiskey and currants to substitute the called for dark rum and sultanas, respectively.

Have you ever come across - ? No! Have you ever tasted a banana cake that's like a Christmas cake? You'll now start posting recipes in my comments box to tell me of various banana cake recipes that do :) *giggle* I would welcome them.

While I'm asking - do you know what makes a cake into a bread? I don't know. Why is it that most banana cakes call themselves breads? Is it to do with the loaf tin that they are made in?

So... a confession. I made this cake because I was being made to pack up house, again! Do you remember the previous times that I moved flat and I found myself just having to make two lemon and ginger cheesecakesand bramble jelly? My fellow resident tutors and flat movers, David and Lucy, were really worried about the lengths that I went to avoid putting things away. So now, I'm very aware that I bake to distract myself from the pain of packing boxes; there's always good reason. This time, I had a hoard of frozen bananas, 12 as it turned out, that needed to be used up. Well, why not strike a compromise with the chore of packing and this golden (brown) opportunity, and try out quick and easy banana bread recipes.

So, I did with Nigella's and Deb's (from Smitten Kitchen).

According to Nigella (How to be a Domestic Goddess), '[T]his is the first recipe anyone hesitant about baking should try: it's fabulously easy and fills the kitchen with that aromatic fug which is the natural atmospheric setting for the domestic goddess.'Well that sold it to me... as if I needed any convincing. Nevertheless, there are even easier, equally enticing banana cakes out there. Cue: Smitten Kitchen's Jacked Up Banana Bread. I made her banana bread at the same time that I made Nigella's and it is just a tad easier to make. I'll post that recipe later, because this variation of Nigella's banana bread recipe, with the whiskey and currants, supersedes it in taste, flavour and richness.

Ingredients (and a suggestions box of other substitutes for the dried fruit and liquor at the bottom of this post)

• 100g currants.
• 75ml sloe whiskey, or any whiskey
  
• 150g plain flour
• 25g cocoa powder
• 2 tsp baking powder
• ½ tsp bicarbonate of soda
• ½ tsp salt
• 125g unsalted butter, melted
• 90-100g soft brown sugar
• 2 large eggs
• 3 large or 4 small very ripe bananas, mashed (about 300g in weight with the skins off)
• 60g chopped walnuts
• 100g dark chocolate, roughly chopped

Method

1. Put your chosen dried fruit and liquor into a small saucepan (I measured the currants and whiskey directly in the saucepan for ease) and bring to the boil. Now, remove from the heat, cover the saucepan and leave for an hour or so, in order that the currants can plump up as they absorb the most of the liquid. After which, Nigella says, to drain the currants. I decided it was a waste of the sloe whiskey, so I ended up adding it all, currants and whiskey, to the cake mix at the appropriate step. I'm rushing ahead of myself here. While the currants are plumping up, move on with the rest of the recipe.

2. Preheat the oven to 170°C/325°F/gas mark 3 and line a 2lb loaf tin. I only have a 1.5 lb loaf tin and it just about manages it.

3. Measure out the plain flour, cocoa powder into a medium sized bowl. Now add in the bicarbonate of soda, baking powder, salt and give them all a good mix with a metal or wooden spoon. This means that you don't get any lumps of salt, cocoa powder or bicarbonate of soda in the eventual cake.

4. Melt the butter. I've used both methods of carefully zapping butter in the microwave (um, careful and zap don't seem to be natural partners but what other word describes what happens in a microwave?) and melting it in a saucepan. Both work. If you are going to zap it in the microwave, choose a large pyrex bowl that is big enough to make the cake mixture in, as it will save on the washing up later.

5. Once melted, add the sugar to the butter and stir well until the sugar is well blended into the butter. It should look almost toffee-like in colour because of the brown sugar. Follow with the eggs. Beat them in, one at a time, to the sugary buttery mixture then add the mashed bananas and beat well.

6. Now add the currants and the remainder of the liquid in the saucepan, along with the walnuts, vanilla extract and the chopped chocolate to the mixture and stir well.

7. Add in the flour mix (see 3) but do it a third at time, stirring well after each addition. Once all of the dry mixture is mixed in, add the cake mixture into the loaf tin and bake in the middle of the oven for 1 hour. I check after 40 minutes and if the cake looks like it is browning at the top too quickly, then I cover it with some baking paper to protect the cake from burning. Sometimes the cake takes a little bit longer to bake, so don't worry if it needs an extra 15-20 minutes in the oven. You'll know when the cake is done when you insert a cake tester, or I use a sharp knife, into the cake and it comes out clean.

8. Leave the cake in the loaf tin to cool down completely, before slicing it up to eat. It does smell absolutely heavenly at the point the cake leaves the oven, but the inside of the cake steams up and collapses if you cut into it when it's warm. Trust me. I made that mistake last week at Baking Club when we were far too impatient to wait because we were experimenting with various liquors and naturally wanting to taste the different flavours.

Verdict? Scrum-dili-O-cious. Honestly, this version is truly scrumptious and rich in flavour. I've made a few variations (listed below) but there is something to be said about how the flavours of whiskey, chocolate and banana complement each other and stand their ground against each other in this cake. You know how I said to leave the cake to cool down completely before cutting into it. I discovered that this cake gets better with age. The chocolate, whiskey and banana mature well together if you can bear to leave it a day or two before eating it and you'll have a more complex flavour to savour. Leave the cake in an airtight container for at least a week and it won't dry out... if it lasts that long!

Baking Club came round last Wednesday laden with various liquors. We tried a few out. Banana, Date and Toffee Bread: 100g chopped up dried dates, 75ml of butterscotch schnapps, subsitute half of the soft brown sugar with dark brown sugar. I'd also leave out the 25g of cocoa powder with replace it with plain flour so that the toffee has a chance of coming through. The original Banana and Chocolate Bread: 100g sultanas, 75ml dark rum - this is Nigella's original recipe. Tastes alright but the whiskey and currants one tastes even better. I might try this one out later without the chocolate and compare it to Smitten Kitchen's version. Banana, Apricot and Chocolate Bread: 100g chopped up dried apricots, 75ml apricot brandy. - gave this one away before tasting it.

An alternative to Christmas cake, perhaps?

Han-na Cha : 26 Oct 2012 00:06 |  Tags: Baking Banana Chocolate Christmas Cocoa Currant Dark Chocolate Recipes Rum Sultana Walnut Whiskey |  Comments (2) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

And finally I baked… Dorie Greenspan's Banana Bundt Cake

Saturday, Week 1:

I've indulged myself with a lie-in this morning and at midday, I'm lounging in my pj's with my dressing gown wrapped around me for warmth on this rather chilly October day. I have a to-do list as long as my arm, and I should have been out and about at least an hour ago... However, yesterday my legs were shaking as I got out of bed. The fresh intake of students, the start of the academic year, all that energy and effort, lack of sleep, adrenalin are taking their toll on me. Somewhat sheepishly, I also admit that some of it is my own fault for staying up and baking a cake.

I confess that I am a baking addict. When I have been putting off baking for some time, there comes a point when I just have to bake something. The urge starts in my stomach and emanates out to the rest of my limbs. My fingers drum nervously on the desk, my legs crisscross, and I keep fidgeting in my seat. I am physically twitching to just get on and bake something. I don't get this about cooking food. This is purely related to baking, baking, baking. And so this is how I realised that I am a baking addict.

Earlier this week, 4 sad, brown bananas on top of my fridge kept asking me to bake them in Dorie Greenspan's Banana Bundt Cake. (I've been wanting to bake this cake since I saw it here as a Secret Agent Cakein Ari's blog six months ago.)

"No brown bananas," I said, "I don't have time to do anything about you now."

"But you must, you must." They sang back, "In a day, we will be too far gone for even a cake to rescue us."

So, I made a date with them for Wednesday evening. Which is how, after walking around my block and talking about freshers stuff with students, at 11pm on Wednesday evening, I eventually started baking Dorie Greenspan's Banana Bundt Cake (from Baking: From My Home to Yours).

By the way, I noticed that every blog post about this cake only uses cup measures, which rather irritates me as a UK baker, used to measuring things out in grams or ounzes. So, I've measured it out in grammes in this version of the recipe. Instead of plain flour, I substituted self-raising flour for all-purpose flour. I know that all-purpose flour is the US equivalent of plain flour. However, I read on some forum that the results are better with self-raising when baking cakes.

Ingredients

• 4 very ripe bananas, mashed up in a bowl
• 225g butter, cubed and softened
• 300g golden caster sugar (I decided on golden caster sugar for a richer flavour, but 3/4 of the specified amount.)
• 2 tsp vanilla extract
• 450g self-raising flour, sifted
• 2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 2 large eggs, beaten
• 225ml sour cream or yoghurt (in the absence of sour cream, but wanting the richness, I had some leftover double cream which I mixed with yoghurt)

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 180C/350F/Gas Mark 4 and generously grease a 12 cup/23-25cm bundt tin. I used a pampered chef oil spray to coat it liberally with oil.

2. Mash up the bananas in a bowl and put them to one side. In another bowl, sift the flour, bicarbonate of soda and salt.

3. In a large mixing bowl, cream the butter for about 5 minutes, until the colour is pale and it looks fluffy. Then add the sugar and cream again for a few minutes. I used my Sainsbury Basic electric mixer but I had total KitchenAid Mixer envy because it would have come into its element with this cake. Indeed, Dorie recommends using a stand mixer with a paddle attachment.

4. Add in the vanilla extract. One by one, add in the eggs and give it a good whizz with the mixer after each egg. Add in the bananas. Give it another whizz with the mixer.

5. Next, add in half of the dry ingredients (flour, salt and bicarb of soda) and mix well. Then pour in the sour cream or yoghurt and mix it in. Finally, beat in the remainder of the dry ingredients and finish it off with a good whizz with the mixer to make sure that everything is beaten in.

6. Pour the cake batter into the bundt tin and spread it out evenly on top. Firmly bang it on a work surface to release any trapped air bubbles.

7. Bake in the oven for 65-75 minutes, or until the cake tester comes out clean. However, check on it around the 35 minute mark and cover with foil if it looks like it is browning too quickly on top, so that the bottom doesn't burn.

8. Let it cool in the bundt tin for 10 minutes, then carefully invert it onto a wirerack to reveal a beautifully turned out bundt cake and allow it to cool completely.

I made the suggested lemon drizzle icingwhich perfectly complements the cake and is simple to make.

Ingredients

• 150g icing sugar, sifted
• lemon juice. Start with 2 teaspoons. I ended up using juice of half a lemon.

Method

1. Sift the icing sugar into a bowl. Add in the lemon juice, starting with 2 teaspoons. Mix. Keep adding the lemon juice, one teaspoon at a time, until the icing reaches the consistency you desire for a drizzle.

2. Drizzle the icing over the cake. Ta Da.

my sliver of bundt cake for breakfast

The verdict? Oh, I need to be careful to make sure that I hold myself back and don't come across as OTT at this point because this cake tastes even better than the reviews promised it would be.

Can a cake be described as soft and velvety? Because that's how I would describe the texture of this cake. Each mouthful is an utter joy and delight to eat. The flavour is rich and deep. The lemon drizzle lends a subtle sharpness to the richness of the cake. My colleagues had some the next day and they loved it.

Top Tip: I'll let you into a secret. This is one of those cakes that gets even better if you leave it a day (at least!) if you can resist it. I dare you. Sure, the icing will become more opaque over time, but you can store it in an airtight container for at least a week. The flavours mature and become even softer. MMmmmmmm.....

Han-na Cha : 11 Oct 2011 01:00 |  Tags: Banana Being Honest Bundt Cake Fruit Lemon Recipes |  Comments (7) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Allinson's Banana Cake: my marathon training cake

I'm training to run a marathon that is in May - EEEEeeeekK! It's my first one and to say that I'm terrified is an understatement. So, I try not to think too much of the distance or the number of hours that I'll be running. However, I can't seem to stop myself thinking about what food to feed myself towards the end of a long run. I am ravenous. It's a different kind of hunger to when I was training for my first half marathon. Then, I found myself craving melons towards the 10 mile mark. So far, I can't seem to eat enough of this one cake.

I know that my latest posts have been about buttermilk, but bear with me whilst I share one more buttermilk cake recipe and then I'll move onto something else. This is the one that started it all. It began a few years ago when I found this gem of a recipe on the back of Allinson's Wholemeal Self-raising Flour packet. I wasn't entirely convinced at how it would turn out. But I thought, 'why not? I've got the ingredients at hand. What do I have to lose but maybe some bananas that are going off anyway, some sugar, butter and flour?' So, I made it for an English Tea Party for Study Abroad/Erasmus students at Leicester University as part of their Welcome Programme. And then I had to make it again for my colleagues because it all disappeared before they got a taste.

And..?

3 years on and a couple of banana cake recipes later, this has turned out to be one of my favourite banana cake recipes and I bake it frequently. It's also one of the few cakes that I get a craving for. So, I'll buy bananas deliberately in order to bake this cake, rather than eat the bananas as they are. I know that's not the common practice with bananas. A further confession. Sometimes I see how long I can leave the bananas ripening before they become unusable. (Answer - black and mouldy.) I've proved to myself that the banana in its various shades of mottled brown to very black is edible... in a cake... and will last a bit longer if you pop them in the fridge.

One of the nice things about this cake is that you can make variations of it, which is handy when you're baking it frequently. I've experimented by adding 100g of milk or dark chocolate chunks successfully, tried white chocolate chunks (doesn't work because they don't have enough flavour to come into their own in this cake), decorated the top with dried apricots soaked in apricot brandy. My preference? I like it as just a plain banana cake.

I'm sure that you can find even more variations. I'd love to know them so please share :)

Ingredients for Allinson's Banana Cake, adapted by yours truly.

• 100g/3½oz softened unsalted butter, cubed or as I recently discovered, you can subsitute it with 80ml sunflower or vegetable oil. I think that the oil makes the sponge a bit lighter.
  
• 140g/4½oz caster sugar (I halved the sugar, so add some more, if you'd like it a bit sweeter)
• 1 egg, beaten
• 350g/12½oz wholemeal self-raising flour (feel like I should say Allinson's, since its their recipe... and I've only ever used their flour)
• ½ tsp baking powder
• ½ tsp salt
• 2 bananas, mashed
• 75ml/3 fl.oz buttermilk (how to make your own buttermilk)
• optional extra ingredient - 100g chocolate chunks; chopped walnuts or pecans...

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 180°C/350°F/Gas Mark 4. Grease and line a deep cake tin. I find that anything between 18-23cm works. Just vary the baking a time a bit. A 23cm cake tin needs a bit less time in the oven than a 18cm one.

2. Cream the butter and the sugar together until light and fluffy. Then gradually add in the egg. Or, if you're using oil, then beat the sugar and egg together first, then add the oil.

3. Sift together the flour, baking powder and salt. The sifting helps to create lightness which is important when using wholemeal flour. Remember to add the bran that remains in your sieve back into the mixing bowl. I tried using the bran to decorate the cake last time but it just went everywhere so I wouldn't recommend doing that.

4. Add 3. to the butter and sugar and mix well. It will resemble bread crumbs if you're using an electric mixer, or feel very stiff if you're doing it by hand.

5. Add in the mashed bananas and the buttermilk and mix well. If you want to pop in an optional ingredient, such as chocolate chunks or nuts or dried fruit, then do so at this stage

Top Tip: Coat your chocolate chunks lightly with flour before adding them to the cake mixture. This will help them not to sink to the bottom of your cake during the baking process.

6. Transfer the cake mixture into the prepared baking tin, smooth and pop it into the oven for 40-45 minutes, or until the cake tester comes out clean.

I think that it's the combination of the wholemeal flour and banana that gives the cake its wholesome and moreish character. The top of the cake crisps up slightly and lends a wonderful slightly crunchy, sweet flavour. The flavour of the banana isn't too overpowering, for those of you who aren't overly keen on it and leaves you wanting to nibble on some more. Mmmmm Mmmmm MMmmmm.

Incidentally, I do recommend the back of flour packets as a good place to find yummy baking recipes. Flour companies should know these things, since flour is normally the primary ingredient. Now, I should listen to my own advice more often and make those chocolate thins that are on the back of the plain wholemeal flour one...

Han-na Cha : 31 Mar 2011 00:11 |  Tags: Allinson Baking Banana Buttermilk Cake Fruit Marathon Recipes Wholemeal |  Comments (2) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Banana Loaf with Granola Topping

The mixing bowl is the perfect resting place for black, mushy, overly-ripe bananas: they redeem themselves in a cake.

A friend of mine fed me this cake. It was a weightwatchers recipe. Of course, this meant that you could eat ALL of it without feeling any ounce of guilt. I was hooked by the cinnamon granola topping and the cake's wholemeal goodness. I've since wondered about transferring its cinnamon granola goodness to other recipes, like an apple cake.

The first time I made the banana loaf, I stuck to the original recipe and used one banana, 1tbsp runny honey and margarine. The result was on the dry and unsatisfying side. The kind of cake that needs a cuppa. So, I made a few variations to it. This version may just scrape through into the weightwatchers recipe book, that is if you replace the butter with margarine. (I ended up using butter because I finished off the margarine on the previous attempt. Mmmm, mmmm, mmmmm...)

Since baking Nigella's Clementine Cake and brownies, I've learnt that some cakes are best left a day or so in order to allow the flavours to mature. I guess this cake could be eaten warm out of the oven, but the flavours really came out when I left it for a day.

This variation on a Weightwatchers Banana Loaf with Granola Topping recipe will make one banana loaf using a 2lb loaf tin.

Ingredients

Cake Mix 125g butter (or margarine if you'd like a lower fat version) 75g caster sugar 2 eggs, beaten 2 overly-ripe, mushy, black bananas, mashed 1½ tbsp runny honey 225g wholemeal self-raising flour splash of milk Granola Topping 15g chopped walnuts or hazelnuts (I'd run out of hazelnuts) 2 heaped tsp oats 3tsp demerera sugar ½ tsp ground cinnamon

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 180°C.
2. Line the tin with baking paper.
3. Make the granola topping first - combine all the ingredients together in a small bowl and leave it to one side.
4. Whisk the butter and sugar together in a bowl until soft and fluffy (I discovered that an electric whisk makes this process much, much easier.) Then gradually add in the beaten eggs.
5. Mix the mashed bananas and the honey together and then add them to the butter, sugar, egg mixture. On my first attempt, I was slightly concerned about the appearance of the resulting mixture. The mixture didn't want to combine into a smooth mush. My second attempt had the same result, so I'm thinking that this look is normal.
6. Slowly add in the flour to the mixture and mix it until it achieves a 'soft, dropping consistency'. It's a phrase that I picked up from my lemon drizzle cake recipe and perfectly describes how the mixture should drop off the spoon. I added a wee splash of milk at this point to reach this consistency.
7. Spoon the cake mixture into the tin, brush the top with milk to help stick the granola topping to the cake (good tip, Lucy!) then evenly sprinkle the granola mixture on top. The recipe suggested making a small furrow down the middle of the mixture. Is the result is a more even loaf?
8. Bake for 50mins in the middle of the oven, until the skewer comes out clean. Remove the cake from its tin and move it to a wire rack to cool.

Not a dry crumb at the end! Enjoy.

Han-na Cha : 10 May 2010 02:03 |  Tags: Baking Banana Cake Fruit Granola Loaf Recipes Weightwatchers |  Comments (16) |  Close comments |  Report a problem