I’ll let you into a little secret. I absolutely hate, loathe and despise bananas in every shape and form. Au naturel, mashed, chopped up and sprinkled in a fruit salad, flavouring a banoffi pie, it doesn’t matter. They’re all vile to me! On a level with spiders for other people.
So it’s pretty impressive that I have this banana loaf cake recipe at all and that’s incredibly popular and succesful.
But successful it is proving to be as a staple in a couple of cafes who order it time and time again.
The trick with good banana cake is to use bananas which are on the turn. You know the ones I mean – going a bit brown and speckly that you’d probably bin rather than eat. That’s not to say you can’t make it with fresher bananas just that the browner ones have more sugar and make it a tad mroe sweeter. It’s also a great way to use up those old bananas rather than create more food waste.
And for hungry kids coming from school it’s not the worst snack either. Yes, it does contain sugar but it’s not overloaded with it – apart from the bananas there’s approximately 9g added sugar per slice if you chop it into 12 pieces and absolutely no additives or perservatives. Just the ticket to keep hungry tums topped up until dinner time.
85mlButtermilkNote, if you don't have any buttermilk you can make your own. Pop 85ml of milk into a jug, add a 0.5-1 tbsp lemon juice and set aside for 15 minutes.
2 Eggs
1tspVanilla Essence
1 tsp Bicarbonate of Soda
1pinchSalt
Instructions
Preheat the oven to 180C (170C if fan assisted) and grease and line a 1lb loaf tin. Mash the bananas well and set to one side.
Sieve the flour, bicarbonate of soda and salt together in a separate bowl and set aside
In another bowl, cream together the butter/magarine and caster sugar until light, pale and fluffy.
Add in the eggs and vanilla and mix well.
Next, add the mashed bananas and buttermilk.
Finally add in the flour until combined.
Pour the mixture in the prepared tin and cook for around one hour or when a knife inserted comes out clean. If you find your loaf cake is browning too much on top you can drop the oven temperature by 10C or place a piece of foil gently over the top.
Once cooked, leave in the tin to cool for ten minutes before turning out the loaf cake onto a rack and allow to cool completely. Serve on its own or toasted and spread with a knob of butter.
Banana Loaf Cake
I’ll let you into a little secret. I absolutely hate, loathe and despise bananas in every shape and form. Au naturel, mashed, chopped up and sprinkled in a fruit salad, flavouring a banoffi pie, it doesn’t matter. They’re all vile to me! On a level with spiders for other people.
So it’s pretty impressive that I have this banana loaf cake recipe at all and that’s incredibly popular and succesful.
But successful it is proving to be as a staple in a couple of cafes who order it time and time again.
The trick with good banana cake is to use bananas which are on the turn. You know the ones I mean – going a bit brown and speckly that you’d probably bin rather than eat. That’s not to say you can’t make it with fresher bananas just that the browner ones have more sugar and make it a tad mroe sweeter. It’s also a great way to use up those old bananas rather than create more food waste.
And for hungry kids coming from school it’s not the worst snack either. Yes, it does contain sugar but it’s not overloaded with it – apart from the bananas there’s approximately 9g added sugar per slice if you chop it into 12 pieces and absolutely no additives or perservatives. Just the ticket to keep hungry tums topped up until dinner time.
Banana Loaf Cake
Ingredients
Instructions