In a recent F&W Cooks video, Ben Mims declares his love for banana bread, saying he makes it at least once a week—and that’s how he came up with this banana snacking cake recipe. It’s a “vaguely healthier alternative,” substituting olive oil for butter and maple syrup for sugar. As an added bonus, the cake itself only uses five ingredients, and comes out of the oven incredibly fragrant. You can eat it any time of day, whether you're looking for a savory-sweet breakfast or dessert (pro tip: add powdered sugar and a scoop of ice cream). The best part? It's ready in just over an hour. Check out some of Mim's main tips for making the recipe below.
Stick with olive oil
While Mims would normally use butter and flour to prep his pan before the batter goes in, in this instance, he uses olive oil—this complements the olive oil in the recipe.
Remove excess flour
After adding the parchment paper to the pan and greasing it up, add the flour. Shake it around the pan to distribute it evenly, and then flip the pan on its side and knock to remove the excess.
Aerate your flour
Mims stirs the flour around before he adds it to the mixing bowl—this ensures it is aerated, and nice and light. Then, he uses a spatula to sweep off the excess in the measuring cup.
Slice, don’t mash, your bananas
Mims says the nice thing about this cake is that unlike banana bread, which uses mashed bananas, you get these big chunks of banana strewn within. After you’ve sliced the banana into pieces, make sure you fold it into the batter well, so everything is coated evenly.
Use the toothpick test
After you take the cake out of the oven, Mims says to use a toothpick to make sure it’s done. Simply slide the toothpick into the center of the cake—if it comes out clean with no crumbs, you’re good to go.
Don’t forget the powdered sugar
After the cake cools, you can dust on a little powdered sugar as the finishing touch. (Note that Mims says he does this if he plans on eating the cake for an afternoon snack or dessert. Breakfast, not so much.)
Get the recipe here.
This article was written by Bridget Hallinan from Food & Wine and was legally licensed through the NewsCred publisher network. Please direct all licensing questions to legal@newscred.com.
