Banana Cake

A simple no-fail banana cake recipe that uses pantry basics. Made with brown sugar this cake is soft, moist and delicous with hints of caramel flavour.

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Course: Baking

Cuisine: New Zealand

Keyword: Banana Cake, Banana Cake Recipe, Easy Banana Cake, Banana Cake with lemon icing, Banana Cake NZ

Servings: pieces

Calories: 87kcal

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4.54 from 32 votes

Ingredients

125 g butter
125 g brown sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla essense
2 eggs
2 banana (very ripe) 200g when peeled
2 tablespoon milk 30ml
1 teaspoon baking soda
225 g flour
1 teaspoon cinnamon
2 teaspoon baking powder

Instructions

Preheat your oven to 180 degrees celsius
Cream the butter, brown sugar and vanilla
Add the eggs and beat
Stir through the mashed bananas (I do this on low speed with my stand mixer)
Heat the milk until piping hot, I do this in the microwave approx 20 seconds. Stir the baking soda into the milk, it will foam and increase in volume as the baking soda activates.
Add the baking soda and milk to the cake batter, stir through. (I do this on low speed with my stand mixer)
Add flour, baking powder and cinnamon to the cake batter and stir through, I use a wooden spoon for this step.
Pour the banana cake batter into a lined cake tin. I like to use a large rectangular tin (it means I can cut squares of cake that will easily fit in my kids lunchboxes.)
Bake at 180 degrees celsisus for 35 minutes or until a skewer come out clean when pierced into the morning of the cake.

Notes

Tips

Use Ripe Bananas: I can't emphasise this enough, your cake will be much nicer with the ripest of ripe brown spotty-skinned bananas.
Dissolve the baking soda entirely in the hot milk, if it doesn't dissolve and froth up you, otherwise you can end up with the horrible baking soda taste in your banana cake.
I use a square cake tin to make cutting it up into lunchbox sized pieces easier
Lemon Cream Cheese Icing: My favourite way to elevate banana cake is to top it with lemon cream cheese icing.
Store your un-iced banana cake in an airtight container on the bench for up to 3-4 days, or wrap the cake well in cling film and freeze for up to 3 months.

Lemon Cream Cheese Icing

I start by beating 50g softened butter and 100g softened cream cheese
I then add a pinch of salt, 2 tablespoon of lemon juice and a cup of icing sugar, and beat well
Next I add one more cup of icing sugar and beat until you have a lovely smooth soft cream cheese icing.

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