Banana Cake with Salted Caramel Icing

I've been on the fence about blogging this recipe for the last few days. I made this beast of a cake for a friend of mine, and since his birthday was during the week I had to bake the cake on a weeknight so the only pictures I could get were some shoddy night ones and a few of it at work in my ugly plastic cake carrier. It's also quite similar to a cake I've posted recently. But it generated so much interest and requests for the recipe when I posted a sneak peak of it on instagram and facebook that I just had to write it up for you guys, even with the random mish-mash of pictures.

My friend is not a fan of the light sponge & cream cakes so I made sure to avoid anything like that (even though I personally love those sort of cakes). I used my trusty banana cake recipe and made 4 towering layers of cake, sandwiched with a LOT of salted caramel icing. Surprisingly this is my first attempt at a salted caramel icing, I've made sauces before but I have been trying to resist the temptation to put salted caramel in everything. But it's hard. This seemed like a good opportunity to use it though, the salted caramel icing was a more than suitable match for the dense but soft banana cake layers. The thick swirls of icing looked so pretty in the bowl that I opted for the lazier, swirly icing finish to the outside of the cake. I'm not 100% pleased with the texture and flavour of the icing, I think next time I might try a Swiss meringue buttercream with salted caramel instead. This particular icing is verryyyy buttery and very rich, so I probably used a little more icing than was necessary for this cake. I've pulled back some of the butter from the quantities that I used, hopefully that might fix it but let me know if you have issues.

I borrowed a trick from my genius friend Karen from Citrus and Candy and topped off the cake with some sliced bananas that I covered in some sugar and bruleed with a blow torch. I made the rookie mistake of torching them on the night so I could take photos, which meant that I had to bring the cake in and re-torch the top of the cake the next morning, which made the icing melt and butter started to drip down the sides. So if you're going to use bananas make sure you caramelise them in a separate pan and only place them on top when you're ready to serve the cake. Or just skip the bananas, the cake is pretty good as it is.

OOPS I nearly forgot to mention! I am lucky enough to be one of the finalists nominated in the Food category for the Pedestrian.TV Blogster awards! It would be great if anyone could send a vote my way. Just go to this link (http://tinyurl.com/pedestrianawards) and click on the 'Like' button next to the Yeah Blog! and that's it! If you're still confused look at the image above for help. I never win anything so it's nice to even be in the running to win this one. Thanks guys!!

Banana Cake with Salted Caramel Icing

(makes a 18-20cm four layer round cake)
Note: You can halve the quantities for the cake and icing and still make a decent sized 2-layer cake.

For the banana cake (based on this recipe):

250g softened unsalted butter (salted is fine too)

2&1/4 cups (about 500g) sugar (I used caster/superfine but granulated white sugar is fine too)

4 eggs

2 cups mashed very over-ripe bananas (about 4 bananas)

1 tsp pure vanilla extract

500g (4 cups) plain flour

2 tsp bicarb (baking) soda

1 tsp salt

1&1/2 tsp ground cinnamon

1/3 tsp ground allspice

1 cup buttermilk (or 1 cup milk + 2 tsp lemon juice)

Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F), grease well and line the base of two 18cm or 20cm (7-8inch) round tins with baking paper. Cream butter and sugar in a large mixing bowl with an electric mixer on high until pale and fluffy. Beat in eggs one at a time until combined then add banana and vanilla and beat until combined. Sift dry ingredients (flour, bicarb, salt, cinnamon, allspice) together in a separate bowl. Add half the dry ingredients and half the buttermilk to them mixture, fold until just combined, then add the remaining dry mixture and buttermilk and repeat. Divide mixture between the tins and bake for 50-60 mins or until a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean and the cake is golden brown. (If you only have one tin bake one cake after the other) Cool cake in its tin on a wire rack for a few minutes before turning out and then cool completely on wire rack. Cake can be prepared the night before assembling and refrigerated in airtight containers.

For the salted caramel icing (based on this Chow recipe):

1 cup granulated sugar

4 tbsp water

1 cup heavy cream

500g butter (4&1/2 sticks), at room temperature

1-2 tsp fine salt, adjust to taste

4 cups (about 500g) icing (powdered) sugar

Optional: 2 extra bananas, sliced + sugar to sprinkle over for decoration, or banana chips

Briefly stir together sugar and water in a small saucepan and bring to a boil over medium-high heat. Continue cooking, without stirring, until mixture just turns dark amber in colour, about 10 minutes. Take care not to let it turn too dark or your caramel will be bitter. Remove from heat and slowly add in cream (mixture will bubble a lot), carefully whisking until completely smooth. Set aside until cool to the touch, about 25 minutes.

Place butter in a large mixing bowl and beat on high with an electric mixer until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes. Reduce speed to low, add icing sugar, and mix until completely incorporated. Turn mixer off and scrape down the sides of the bowl, then add caramel. Beat icing on high speed, gradually adding salt to taste and then beat until airy and thoroughly mixed. If mixture is runny, cover and refrigerate until stiff, about 45 minutes before using, or add more icing sugar to stiffen.

To assemble cake; trim any domed tops off your cakes to level them and them carefully slice cakes in half with a long sharp knife to form four equal layers. Place your first layer on your cake stand/plate and cover with a thin layer of icing, smoothing with a spatula/offset spatula. Sandwich with another layer of top and repeat. Crumb coat outside of cake and then cover with a thicker layer of icing, swirling the outside if you wish. Refrigerate until ready to serve, remove from fridge at least 30 mins before serving to bring back to room temperature. Place sliced banana in a pan, sprinkle with sugar and caramelise with a blow torch. When ready to serve, top with banana slices (or banana chips, which are much easier) Leftover cake can be stored in an airtight container in the fridge.