Banana Cake

From Hands Across the Kitchen, Hands Across the Water, 2012.

I began looking through this book at the recipes but found that I became far more caught up with the story of the work done by the Hands Across the Water, a charity group that helps Thai orphans and their communities. It was begun after the 2004 tsunami to assist those that the disaster had affected.

The book is a collection of recipes of top celebrity chefs’ favourite childhood foods. They come with recollections of their childhood. I guess that since they are recipes of childhood favourites they are not the chefs’ recipes but those of the people who made them for them. And I think it is true that foods that you particularly enjoyed as children stay with you as adults as favourites. If you see the book try and get hold of one, though as it was pre-sold before printing to ensure that there was no loss made for the orphans, it may be difficult to get hold on one.

I chose to cook the banana cake that was a favourite of Daniel Vaughan and that was cooked by his mother. It was a very easy recipe. All of the ingredients were basically put into the KitchenAid and beaten for a couple of minutes.

There was ¼ cupof milk with a teaspoon of lemon juice. Two bananas were mashed and put in with a cup of sugar and 2 cups of self-raising flour. Two eggs were beaten lightly and added as well as 60g softened butter. Easy measurements and just a few ingredients.

After beating, the mixture went into a small-sized greased loaf tin and then into the oven to cook for about an hour.

Banana cakes are always winners and this one, because of its easy making, is certainly worth trying. It’ll probably be the recipe I turn to whenever there’s a spare couple of bananas waiting to be used.

Taste: ✔✔✔✔

Ease of cooking: ✔✔✔✔

Banana Cake

From Bourke Street Bakery: the Ultimate Baking Companion, Paul Allam & David McGuinness, Murdoch Books, 2009.

Why is it that every time we buy bananas we seem to end up with two or three left that are over ripe? And a banana cake seems to pop up as the obvious solution for what to do with them.

A handsome copy of the Bourke Street Bakery cookery book has been on the shelf for some time and I had never got into cooking from it. Well there were bananas left and there was a recipe here so I got straight into it.

The pre-work was done: turning on the oven to heat up and lining the cake tin with baking paper.

The ingredients were those of a reasonably standard cake mix: 250 g unsalted butter, 355 g caster sugar, 4 eggs,  200 g sour cream, 300 g self-raising flour, 2 or 3 ripe bananas, 20 g golden syrup.

The usual cake mix work was done:. Butter and caster sugar were whisked until creamed. I added a little vanilla paste as I had no vanilla beans at the time. The eggs, four of them, were beaten in one at a time. Next came some sour cream in two batches. After that was added the self-raising flour, also in two batches.

The mixture was now ready except for the bananas. These were mashed and golden syrup drizzled over them. They were then folded into the cake mix rather lightly. The mix was then put in the cake tin and baked for about an hour.

The recipe also included a caramel sauce to go with the cake but I decided to not use it.

This turned out a well-formed cake. The lightly folded in banana mix gave it a nicely textured look and feel. It didn’t take long at all to demolish it and it lasted on the shelf for a far shorter time than the original bananas that were used in it. I don't think I'd worry about looking elsewhere for banana cake recipes the next time we have leftovers.

Taste: ✔✔✔✔

Ease of cooking: ✔✔✔✔