Baking With Dorie (Rewind): Lots-Of-Ways Banana Cake

I remember making my first banana cake when I was 17, with the recipe I found in my mother's drawer. It was for a family gathering we were having later that night. And guess what? An aunt, Mak Mok who came for the potluck dinner also came with a banana cake!! I remember another aunt, Mak Ngah and a few other older cousins were telling me that mine tasted better than Mak Mok's!! Of course, I know now that they were being very nice and wanted to encourage me to bake...

This recipe is slightly different that the one I made almost 21 years ago (you would've guessed my age by now, right?).

Lots-Of-Ways Banana Cake was the chosen recipe by Grapefruit of BWD in April. I am on a mission to bake of all BWD previous challenges before I joined the group and hope to complete it by the time my turn to chose a recipe comes in August.

The texture of this cake is very soft and delicate, but they were not crumbly. Their softness were more of the melt-in-your-mouth kind of soft. I subsituted coconut milk with sour cream and sweetened shredded coconut with unsweetened dessicated coconut. I would've loved to add chopped walnuts or pecans but ran out of them. I think the the nuts would definitely add a nice crunch to the soft cake.

I made a one-layer cake and baked it in a 7-inch round cake pan, instead of the 9-inch recommended, just so I could get a taller cake. I believe banana cakes fall under the 'plain and rustic cake' category (my opinion, solely) and thus need not be frosted nor iced. I simply dusted some cocoa powder and the barely there bittersweet taste complimented the cake beautifully.


You may find the recipe on pages 205 & 206 of Baking from my home to yours by Dorie Greenspan or here.