Pahleeze! Don’t wait for a Birthday to Bake this Cake
One thing I will always remember about my dad is his love for banana cake. Whenever it was his birthday my mom would bake him a Pillsbury boxed banana cake. By-the-way, it was the seventies and boxed cake mixes were the new, big thing.
This banana cake recipe is an adaptation of the formula for our house birthday cake at the restaurant. I’m pretty sure people have started making up that it is their birthday –just in order to get a piece. I don’t blame them one bit, the cake is killer.
This is the moistest, the lightest, and the most deeply banana-flavored cake you will ever taste. Because the recipe has such a large volume of moisture, we bake this in a half sheet pan so that it is sure to be done in the middle. I have tried this cake in a regular 9” X 13” cake pan and it can be done, just know– it is not a tall cake. The sheet pan bakes better in my opinion as it allows better circulation and more even heat. This is what in the bakery business we refer to as a “sheet cake.”
If you want to get fancy with it, once it is cooled you can always cut it, frost and stack it like a layer cake, it works fine and holds up well to handling. I like to serve it with a scoop of creamy homemade vanilla ice cream.
I am proud to say this is now the cake she bakes him on his birthday.
Banana Sheet Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting
Mix the wet ingredients in a medium sized bowl with a whisk. Allow sugar to “melt” into other ingredients for a few minutes before adding dry ingredients.
9 oz Oil
11 oz Sugar
12 oz Ripe Bananas-pureed
5 oz Brown Sugar
4 oz Buttermilk
4 Eggs
2 Tsp Vanilla
Dry ingredients
10 oz Cake Flour
¼ tsp Cinnamon
1 tsp Baking Soda
½ tsp Salt
Gently whisk wet ingredients, add dry ingredients.
Pour into a greased half sheet pan lined with parchment paper
Bake 325 10-15 minutes.
Cream Cheese Frosting
1lb Cream cheese at room temperature
8 TBS Butter at room temperature
1 Cup Powdered Sugar- sifter
1 tsp Vanilla
Pinch salt
Whip all together until homogenized.