Hello...only me. I have a cake for you, and not just any cake, THE cake. THE cake that makes people look at you when they put a forkful in their mouths like "are you being serious?". And the cake that means people sort of whisper "who made this?". The cake that demands the recipe be surrendered immediately...sort of hence my return to these fair pastures.
The only tricky thing here, is that I think it's going to be bit of a hard sell to you chaps. Firstly the whole banana and pumpkin thing...that makes people give you funny looks..."pumpkin?" but I yell at you "YES PUMPKIN, have you HEARD of CARROT CAKE". Veggie cakes, as I've professed before, are a dream texture and win at allowing yourself to pretend that you really do need that second slice. So YES to pumpkin.
Second, there's the whole brown thing. Yeah it's a nice bundt shape but it's not exactly pretty or cute, it's just a big brown cake. But pleeeeease don't let that put you off...a brownie is brown and boring looking but I bet that never stopped you.
The biggest thing though is that compared to the fireworks taste...there is NO EFFORT on your part. You don't even have to get your electric whisk out, which is why I've made it so often recently and why I can offer such a guarantee to the love you will receive on the baking of the beast. So bake this now please, and while it's in the oven you'd better give some thought to the whole taking compliments thing...you know, just the right amount a graciousness and 'what this ol' thing' to not sound ungrateful but also quite dismissive of your part in the achievement. That's the hard part you see. With Love and Cake.
Banana and Pumpkin Salted Caramel Cake.
A few notes:
- Ok pumpkin, not one of your everyday ingredients here in the UK...what I do is get my hands on all the giant edible ones I can in the winter (thanks Grandad) and steam and freeze them in bags divided into 'cups' or 245g, because recipes that call for pumpkin are often American and therefore measured in cups. You can buy it canned in some supermarkets or on Amazon.
- The glaze turns this from a nice hearty banana cake into the epicness I describe above...so it is a must.
You will need
1 x large bundt tin, greased and floured
For the cake
300g pumpkin puree
300g super-ripe banana, mashed until fairly smooth
400g caster sugar
115g flavourless oil, like vegetable or sunflower
3 eggs
1 generous splosh of vanilla extract
375g plain flour
pinch salt
2 tsp bicarb
1/2 tsp baking powder
For the glaze
- Preheat the oven to 180°c.
- In a large bowl whisk together the pumpkin, banana, caster sugar and oil.
- Whisk in the eggs one at a time followed by the vanilla.
- Gently fold in the rest of the ingredients until you have a smooth and uniform batter.
- Pour it into your cake tin and get it in the oven.
- Set the timer for 45 minutes, after which time, give it a check. I would expect to have to give mine another 10 minutes or so from here but ovens vary so widely that I think this is a good check point. If the top's browning too quickly, cover it with foil.
- When it's bronzed and firm and a knife comes out clean, remove it from the oven and leave it to cool in the tin for had an hour or so, after which time it should be cool enough to handle and turn out of the tin.
- Make the sauce and leave to cool for a good couple of hours, preferably overnight, so it's thick enough to not dribble straight off the cake.
- Pour all over the cake and spread the love.
