Brown Butter Banana Cake

Tender, moist and fluffy. Need I say more?

After a three-year hiatus, I'm finally back!:) To revive Butter Banter, here's a tried-and-tested banana cake recipe that my family loves.

Brown butter makes this the real deal. Trust me, the extra effort is worth it. The smells coming out of the oven will be your reward.

BROWN BUTTER BANANA CAKE RECIPE:

Makes one loaf. I used a 2.5" x 8" rectangular pan.

INGREDIENTS:

2 over-ripe* bananas, peeled and finely mashed (~207g)

120g self-raising flour

1 tsp baking powder

3 regular eggs, at rtp

115g icing sugar

110g unsalted butter, browned (instructions for browning below)

1/4 tsp vanilla extract

1/3 tsp salt

*It is important that your bananas are over-ripe and mushy for texture and flavor. If you didn't have the foresight of buying bananas 5 days before and you need to ripen them quickly, pop them in your freezer for a few hours and let them thaw to rtp before using. It won't be quite the same as time-ripened bananas but, ohwell.

INSTRUCTIONS:

1. Line your baking pan with parchment paper. Preheat oven to 180C. In a medium sized bowl, combine baking powder with self raising flour using a fork.

2. In a small saucepan, melt your butter. Continue heating the melted butter, stirring consistently, till you smell a nutty-almost-caramel aroma and your butter takes on a gold-brown color, with flecks of brown butter solids below (see picture in Notes). Take it off the heat and cool to rtp.

2. Using the whisk attachment and your electric mixer, beat the eggs on medium speed (I use KitchenAid speed #5) until the yolks have all broken (~1 minute). Crank it up to high speed (speed #8) for another 2 minutes. Turn the mixer off.

3. Add in the icing sugar. Beat on low first to ensure the sugar doesn't fly everywhere. Then crank it up to med-high speed (speed #6-8) for the next 2-3 minutes, till your batter reaches ribbon stage (see picture in Notes).

4. Using a spatula, mix in your mashed bananas. Make sure your bananas are finely mashed prior, or chunks of banana will sink to the bottom of your cake during baking.

5. Pour in half of the brown butter and sift in 1/3 of your flour mix, fold till just combined.

Sift in the second 1/3 of your flour and add in salt and vanilla extract. Fold till just combined.

Add in your remaining brown butter and sift in remaining flour. Fold till well combined. Be careful not to over mix the batter or your cake will be dense.

6. Pour batter into your pan. Run a chopstick through the batter in an S shape motion several times to get rid of big air bubbles. Tap your pan on the counter 2-3 times to release more bubbles.

7. Bake for about 42-45 minutes, At the 20min mark, or when the top of your cake has turned golden, put in a baking tray at the top rack to prevent your cake from browning too much. Alternatively, you can loosely cover your cake with a piece of aluminium foil.

8. After getting your cake out of the oven, allow it to cool in the pan for 10 min, and another 5 minutes out of the pan before serving. Don't be impatient with the cooling or your cake will crumble easily when you try to slice it.

Best eaten warm!

The cake keeps refrigerated for 3-4 days, and un-refrigerated for 2 days.

Enjoy!

Recipe adapted from Rasa Malaysia.

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Notes:

• Brown butter is ready when it turns amber-golden with brown butter solids below. Be careful not to burn your butter.

• The bananas I used were splotchy, squishy to the touch, with fragile skin.

• Finely mash your bananas or they will not mix into your batter evenly!

• Ribbon stage: When you lift your whisk and the batter ribbons into the batter without disappearing straight away into your batter. Important for that fluffy, light crumb.