the rose bakery's banana cake

If you're ever looking for a cookbook to buy, can I just say that any book published by Phaidon is bound to be a good one. You'll spot the Phaidon logo on the bottom left hand corner of the front cover (you can't miss it) and to date, The Rose Bakery's 'Breakfast Lunch Tea' is probably my favourite. Just love this collection of true, honest, easy to follow recipes and every photograph in the book just makes me want to lick the page! I guess it's just my type of cooking which is why I love it so much.

This recipe for banana cake requires some very ripe bananas. Preheat oven to 180 degrees. Line a loaf tin with baking paper. In a large bowl, beat together 150g unsalted butter and 180g caster sugar until light and creamy. Add 3 eggs, one at a time, beating well with each addition. Mix in 3 mashed bananas and 110mL mixture of milk and natural yoghurt. Add 1 tsp bicarb soda and 1/2 tsp salt with 350g sifted plain flour. Fold in 100g chopped walnuts.

Combine the mixture well and spoon into the prepared tin. Bake for 1 hour or until a knife inserted in the centre comes out clean.

Here's what the book looks like.

Remove the cake from the oven and let to cool before taking it out. The one thing I've learnt with banana bread/cake is to not to eat it straight away but let it sit in the fridge overnight; trust me, it completely changes the texture of the cake. For ages I wondered how to get banana bread to taste like the ones you buy outside at the shops and the trick is to simply stick it in the fridge.

Not a bad looking cake at all. Probably not as sweet or buttery as the banana cake you'll find at the shops but still a good cake at the end of the day.

I'm fast running out of banana cake/bread recipes to try so if you have any good ones, please do send my way. I seem to consistently have a stash of old ripened bananas in the freezer which I don't know what to do with. And yes, I do have a soft spot for banana bread and old ripened bananas are just perfect for it I think.