Banana Cake

Hurray! Today is my mum’s birthday and the entire family came by to celebrate with us. And with a birthday comes cake. A banana cake in this case.

Since a while I’ve started to love bananas more and more. I used to never eat fruit. A bad habit, yes I know, but I just didn’t like most fruits we have lying around the house (apples, tangerines). So instead of going to the store and buying fruit that I did like, I just never ate it.

But I’m taking a turn in my life now and want to be a bit healthier. Which means watching the amounts of food I eat (since over-eating is nice when you’re eating but not so much after), going out skating two times a week AND start eating fruit. So now I’m being a good girl, eating a banana and a pear a day.

So I offered to bake a cake for my mum’s birthday party and started going through the book and I knew I wanted to make this banana cake the moment I saw it. Granted, this is far from healthy but hey, it’s a birthday cake.

This banana cake is very firm so if you want your guests to eat any of the snacks you’ve made for after the cake-and-coffee-round I advise you give them a small piece each. But the flavor is very nice! The bottom is still a tiny bit moist and the cake has soaked up all the flavor of the banana put into it. The frosting on top is nice, not too sweet and it gives the cake a nice and creamy touch.

Banana cake

Adapted from: 500 cakes

Yields: 8 persons

Note: I made the recipe twice since I wanted a big cake for the entire family, so the cake in the picture is twice the size of what the recipe is for

Ingredients for the cake

• 2 ripe bananas
• 2 eggs
• 175 ml vegetable oil
• 3 tablespoons milk
• 300 gram light brown sugar
• 150 gram flour
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• Salt
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon powder
• ½ teaspoon ginger powder

Ingredients for the cream cheese frosting

• 200 gram cream cheese
• 85 gram confectioner’s sugar
• 2 teaspoons lemon juice
• 1 banana (optional to put on top of the frosting)

Directions

1. Preheat the oven at 180 °C (350 °F) and grease an 7 inch cake pan. If you use one of these (like I do) I suggest you cover the bottom with baking paper.
2. Mash the bananas in a large bowl and whisk the eggs through the mash.
3. Stir the vegetable oil and milk through the mixture.
4. Sieve any lumps out of the sugar before adding it to the mixture. Stir well.
5. Sieve the flour, baking powder, cinnamon powder and ginger powder into the mixture, add a pinch of salt and fold it into the banana mixture.
6. Pour the batter into the cake pan and bake for about 45 minutes. The recipe said to bake the cake for 1 hour but mine (while making twice the recipe but using a bigger cake pan) was done at 45 minutes.
7. Let the cake cool.
8. In a bowl, mix the cream cheese, confectioner’s sugar and lemon juice until it’s a smooth, creamy mixture.
9. Spread the frosting over the cooled cake. Decorate with the third banana and sprinkle a bit of cinnamon powder over the top.

~ Enjoy!

Vanilla cake with lemon-butter frosting and fondant

I absolutely love baking even though the result is not always the best I can wish for. But, that doesn't stop me from baking a lot. I love making cupcakes but when a friend told me about a contest being held over at Fuckyeah Dessert! I couldn't help but be excited right away. I've never entered a contest and I wanted to take this opportunity to try something new to make my cake as beautiful as possible. That 'something new' was using fondant to cover and decorate the cake. While I loved the challenge of doing it, I think this will be one of the few times I'll be using fondant on an entire cake. Cupcakes? Yes, maybe. But an entire cake is too much and at the end of decorating I had turned into Gordon Ramsey. And then I'm not talking about his cooking-skills.

But, nonetheless, I am proud of the result. Granted, I didn't win the contest but the cake was still delicious. Just a warning for all of you wanting to try it. The cake is very sweet. And while I don't mind a more-than-natural dose of sugar some friends and family told me that it was a bit too much on the sweet side. You are warned...

Ingredients for the cake:
• 170 gram butter (room temperature)
• 140 gram sugar (fine sugar)
• 3 eggs
• 140 gram flour
• 1 ½ tablespoon baking powder
• Pinch of salt
• 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
• 30 gram grated coconut

Ingredients for the filling:
• 115 gram butter (quite soft)
• 450 gram icing sugar (you might need more depending on your taste)
• 3 tablespoons lemon juice (add more depending on your taste)
• 2 tablespoons milk (cold)

Decorations:
• Fondant in 3 different colours
• Edible beads

Recipe:
Start with pre-heating your oven at 180 °C. Grease 2 baking tins (20 centimeters which is about 7,9 inches) and cover the baking tin with parchment paper. If you only have 1 baking tin, bake the halves after each other. I don’t recommend baking the batter in 1 small baking tin since oven heat and baking time won’t allow it to set firmly then.

First you prepare your cake.
Beat the butter and sugar until it is smooth, airy and pale. After, add the eggs one by one and beat them through the batter. Then sieve the flour, baking powder and salt above the mixture and add the vanilla extract and grated coconut. Beat everything until it’s a smooth batter. Divide the batter into the two baking tins and bake for about 20-25 minutes.
When the cake is done, remove the baking tins and parchment paper and put aside to cool down completely.

Second you prepare your filling.
In a large mixing bowl, beat the butter until it’s smooth. Add in the remaining ingredients and beat until the mixture resembles a thick frosting. Chill slightly before using.

When the cake and filling are cooled you can prepare the cake. Cut off the tops of the cakes so you have two smooth, same-sized layers of cake to work with. Put ¾ of the filling onto the bottom layer. When done, gently push the top layer on top of the bottom one. Then, cover the entire cake with the left-over filling and put in the fridge while you prepare your fondant.

When working with fondant, you might want to use gloves to keep it from sticking to your fingers. First, knead the fondant until it feels workable. Spread a bit of icing-sugar over your worktop to keep the fondant from sticking and apply some icing sugar onto a rolling pin. To cover this entire cake you need about 250 grams of fondant. Roll out the fondant until it fits the cake.
When done, get the cake out of the fridge and gently lift the fondant over the rolling pin and position it so that it covers the entire cake. Shape the fondant to the sides of the cake If an air bubble appears, insert a pin on an angle, release air and smooth the area again. When done, trim off excess fondant using a spatula or sharp knife.
When the cake is covered in fondant you can decorate it as you wish using either fondant or pre-made sugar flowers.

~ Enjoy!