Not only a pleasure to look at, this gorgeous cake is wonderfully decadent without being too rich — and it’s actually not that difficult to make. If you want to make a three-layer cake, simply use smaller-sized tins, ideally 16–18cm.
Ingredients
- 160g butter, softened
- 160g brown sugar
- 110g runny honey + extra for drizzling
- finely grated zest of 2 lemons
- 4 very ripe bananas, mashed
- 3 eggs
- 340g plain flour
- 1½ teaspoons baking powder
- 1½ teaspoons baking soda
- 270g sour cream
- 1 tablespoon milk
- 3 ripe bananas, sliced to serve
- honey frosting
- 300g cream cheese, at room temperature
- 150g sour cream
- 70g honey
- seeds of 1 vanilla bean or 1 teaspoon vanilla paste/extract
- finely grated zest of 1 lemon
- Caramel Drops
- 2 cups caster sugar
- 6–8 hazelnuts
- 6–8 toothpicks
Serves 8-10
Method
Preheat the oven to 170°C. Grease, flour and line the bases of two 22–24cm cake tins.
Using a standing mixer or hand-held beater, beat the butter, brown sugar, honey and lemon zest until pale and fluffy. Stir in the mashed banana and eggs. Sift in the flour, baking powder and baking soda, and stir to combine. In a separate bowl, whisk together the sour cream and milk, then add to the banana mixture, stirring to combine. Divide the mixture between tins, smoothing the tops.
Bake until cakes are golden and spring back when lightly pressed, about 35–40 minutes. Remove from the oven and cool the cakes in the tins for 10 minutes before turning out onto wire racks to cool completely.
For the frosting, beat all ingredients with an electric mixer until smooth.
To make the caramel drops, place sugar in a saucepan over medium heat. Stir until melted and then remove from the heat. Insert a toothpick into each hazelnut. Dip in the warm caramel until coated. Hang the nuts over the edge of your kitchen counter (with something heavy on the toothpicks to stop them falling). The caramel will slowly drip and lengthen. Remove toothpicks once caramel has hardened.
To assemble, spread one of the cakes with half of the frosting and scatter over the banana slices. Top with the remaining cake and spread with the remaining frosting. Drizzle with honey and add the caramel drops to serve.
Saffron Swirls & Cardamom Dust by Ashia Ismail-Singer
RRP$49.99, Bateman Books
