Wanting to try another fruit for my gluten free cake sponge I turned to bananas given I seem to always have some sat around in my kitchen. I know the general trend is to throw leftover bananas into a bowl and make bananas bread but if you want something different and lighter then I'd try this cake. The sponge is very light and the cream flavoured with homemade salted caramel gives a wonderful toffee flavour to compliment the bananas. I've tried making the cake with some of the caramel poured over it instead but personally I find it unbalances everything. I'd only recommend doing this if you have a very sweet tooth!
Serves 10-12
Hands-on Time 30 minutes (plus cooling)
Baking Time 35 minutes
Ingredients
Oil for greasing (flavourless e.g. sunflower or vegetable)
130g plus 2 tbsp Light brown sugar
5 Eggs, large
100g Caster sugar
5-6 Bananas, medium-large (ripe)
250g Ground almonds
30g Cornflour
1/8 tsp Fine salt
1tsp Vanilla extract
200ml Double cream
Equipment
Scissors
Baking parchment
2 x 20cm Fixed or push bottom cake tins
Knife
2 Mixing bowls
Electric whisk
Spatula
Wire rack
Preheat the oven to 170°C/150°C (Fan)/325°F/Gas mark 3.
Cut two pieces of baking parchment into circles for the bases of the cake tins.
Grease the tins with oil using kitchen paper and line with the parchment.
Sprinkle 1 tablespoon of light brown sugar over the bottoms of each tin.
Peel and halve two bananas. Place them cut-side down onto the sugar in each tin.
Break the eggs and separate the whites and yolks between the two bowls.
Whisk the egg whites until you have a foam. Keep whisking and gradually add the caster sugar until you have stiff peaks.
Clean and dry the beaters.
Peel and add 200 grams of bananas ensuring you break them up into chunks with your hands, along with 130 grams of light brown sugar to the egg yolks.
Beat with an electric whisk on a high speed (start off slow to avoid splashing) for at least a minute.
Add the ground almonds, cornflour, and salt to the beaten egg yolks and combine using a spatula.
Add the vanilla extract and stir again using the spatula.
Add a scoop of the egg whites to the cake mix and beat to loosen it up. Add half of the egg whites and fold into the mixture. Add the remaining eggs whites, folding again until there are no specks.
Divide the cake mixture between the two tins and smooth using a spatula. Give the tins one tap on the worktop before placing them on a middle shelf in the oven and leaving to bake for 35 minutes.
When the time is up remove the tins from the oven and leave the cakes to sit for 15 minutes.
Carefully turn the cakes out onto a wire rack and remove the baking parchment. You may need to run a palette knife around the edge of the cakes to loosen the sides. Leave the cakes to completely cool.
When you are ready to assemble the cakes, slice up any remaining bananas that you may have.
In a clean bowl combine the caramel and cream together first by stirring and then by whisking until thick.
Ensuring you have the cakes banana-side up, dollop half of the caramel cream on top one of them.
Add a some slices of banana before topping with the second sponge.
Decorate the top with the remaining caramel cream and banana slices.
Enjoy!
