Mum's "Meat Dish" Banana Cake

I call this "meat dish" banana cake because traditionally the recipe actually makes enough to bake it in a meat-dish, and usually we do. It's the perfect cake to whip up to feed a crowd and is always a pleaser with even the fussiest of eaters. I found the recipe in my mother-in-laws hand written recipe journal and this cake, along with the others in the journal have been feeding my husband and his brothers and cousins for decades. So rest assured, it has been rigorously quality assurance tested. 

If you don't fancy making one large tray cake, you could (as I did this time), bake two 22cm round cakes and either ice both, or layer them. I also had enough batter to make a dozen cupcakes, which I've popped in the freezer for another day. 

The chocolate chips were an optional extra that I tried this time, though my MIL wasn't too sure about me changing the recipe, it turned out just as luscious as always. 

You can ice it with cream cheese frosting, a chocolate buttercream, or as I did a simple lemon and/or chocolate icing sugar mixture. Mix 2 cups of sifted icing sugar with 2 tbsp melted butter, and enough liquid to form an icing of your desired consistency. For lemon icing, add lemon juice as the liquid, and for chocolate icing, sift 3-4 tbsp of cocoa powder in with the icing sugar, then add enough water or milk to form the paste. Spread onto the cooled cakes. 

Ingredients (to make one "meat dish" slab cake, or two 22cm round cakes and 12 cupcakes): 

• 4 eggs, room temperature
• 2 cups white sugar
• 7 overripe (practically black) bananas, lightly mashed
• 1 cup or 175 grams of chocolate chips (optional) 
• 3 cups of plain flour
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 2 tsp baking soda 
• 225 grams melted butter

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees celsius and grease or line your cake tins. I always grease the sides and line the bottom with greaseproof paper, this means you'll never have any trouble removing the cake from the pan. 

Using an electric mixer (I used a kenwood cake mixer, but a hand mixer would work), beat the eggs and sugar until light light and fluffy, almost foamy - this is the most important bit for a good cake. Meanwhile, sift the flour, baking soda and baking powder into another bowl. 

Add the bananas to the egg mix and beat well to combine, then add the chocolate chips, beat again. 

Pour the sifted dry ingredients on top and either on a low speed with your cake mixer, or with a wooden spoon fold the dry and wet ingredients until just combined (about 6 turns of your cake mixer), some flour may still be visible. Finally add the melted butter and mix again till everything is combined. 

Pour the batter into your prepared cake tins and put into a hot oven. 

Bake times vary depending on the size of your tin: for a large slab cake bake about 45 minutes, round cakes approximately 35 minutes, and cupcakes approximately 20 - 25 minutes. Just keep an eye on them and test with a skewer. When the skewer comes out clean the cakes are done, also, your nose will let you know when they are nearly done as the smell coming from the oven will be amazing. 

My assortment of cakes and mini-cakes...  

... which never last very long