Banana Cake With Caramel Icing
By: Celia R. Muller
Published: Friday, January 7, 2011 - 8:52am

Ingredients




1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup butter, room temperature
3 large ripe bananas, mashed
2 eggs, room temperature
1/2 cup buttermilk
1/2 teaspoon soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
2 cups flour
For the caramel icing:
3/4 cup granulated sugar
3/4 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup cream
1 tablespoon butter

Preparation

1 Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.** Grease and flour a 12-cup bundt pan. 2 Cream butter, sugar, and bananas together (I used a paddle attachment on my mixer); add eggs one at a time. 3 Dissolve the soda in the buttermilk and blend into the butter-sugar-egg mixture. 4 Sift the flour and baking powder together and add gradually, with the mixer on low. 5 Bake for 35-40 minutes until a tester comes out clean. I know you’re impatient, but let the cake cool before unmoulding or it’ll fall apart when you’re removing it from the bundt pan. 6 Make the icing while the cake cools: Cook sugar and cream together until it forms a soft ball when dropped in cold water, remove from stove, add butter, and beat well before spreading on cake. 7 To caramelize bananas for decoration: Slice a banana.  Melt a pat of butter in a non-stick pan over medium heat and mix a couple of tablespoons brown sugar in with a spatula.  Add the bananas and cook for a minute or two on each side, until a tiny bit brown. 8 To make burnt sugar shards: Place 1/2 a cup of sugar in a small sauce pan and mix in 1 teaspoon water, so it takes on a sandy texture.  Melt the sugar over high heat until it reaches a medium-dark amber color, then cool on a Silpat and break into shards.

About


From The Southern Cook Book (1952): “from Mrs. R.E. Donnell, from Home Tried Recipes, Americus, GA