Lots of Ways Banana Cake

This week’s Tuesdays with Dorie recipe was picked by Kimberly of Only Creative Opportunities. She picked the Lots of Ways of Banana Cake, which really lives up to its name! You can make many variations of this cake: layer cake, filled and frosted. Single cake covered with ganache. Coconut milk or regular milk. Coconut rum or not. Add coconut or other addition like raisins, nuts, etc. Take your pick. It was really nice since I just used what was on hand and didn’t have to get anything at the store. You can get the complete recipe for this cake on Kimberly's blog.

Now, I don’t like bananas very much but I’m ok with banana bread and this looked fairly similar. I actually remembered to get bananas well in advance so they were nice and ripe by the time I made the cake. I opted to make a single layer cake and just dusted it with powdered sugar. I did use the coconut rum and did include coconut. I didn’t have any coconut milk on hand so I just used regular milk. I had a little problem with my cake sticking to the pan, so this is one that you really have to butter the pan within an inch of its life if you want the cake to come out cleanly.

I baked this up and then kind of forgot about it, so I didn’t taste it until a few days later. It was still quite fresh and tasted pretty good. It is somewhat similar to banana bread, but I thought it was a lot sweeter than I expected, and that was nice. This would have been interesting as a regular filled and frosted cake. Dorie suggests filling it with whipped cream or chocolate whipped cream; I think it would also be good with cream cheese icing.

Next week, I get to choose the recipe. I can’t wait!

Recipe from Baking from My Home to Yours by Dorie Greenspan, pages 204 and 205