Cake 3 - Caribbean Banana Bread

At a time when chocolate eggs are eaten for breakfast, I decided that we needed a cake that would be both healthy and rejuvenating, and provide some cake escapism from Easter excess. For this there was only ever going to be one option - a banana loaf. The picture itself looks very uninspiring, but then a banana loaf is all about the taste not the look. A banana loaf is a no nonsense, down to earth cake that does exactly what it says on the tin. However, there is much more to this particular homely creation than meets the eye. Let me attempt to awaken your senses to the delights of 'Caribbean Banana Bread'

First I had to mix together the butter and sugar. I used margarine for this recipe - it tastes just as good but with less calories. Then I added two eggs and whisked until the mixture was light and fluffy. The next step was to combine flour, grated nutmeg, and half a teaspoon of baking powder. The last and most important part was to add to the mixture two mashed bananas, two tablespoons of honey, and chopped pecan nuts.

There is something about the smell of baking banana drifting from the oven that fills me with well being, and evokes wonderful memories of eating banana cake in a cafe called Libra in Lancaster as a kid.

After forty minutes the cake to turned a shade of golden and had risen into craggy peak bursting with flavour. All I had to do now was wait.

Waiting for the cake to cool is the part I find most challenging. When I turned the tin upside down to release the cake, the hammer marks on my literally battered old loaf tin reminded me that this may not be easy. I proceed to smack the tin with various heavy objects until the cake was released - minus its bottom. After resisting the urge to throw the tin against the wall, I carefully removed the bottom of the cake from the tin, stuck it back to the rest of the cake and served it up like nothing had happened. It tasted delicious. So light and fluffy with a good dose of crunch from the pecan nuts. The honey complimented the banana so well, that I almost forgot the strife involved in the making of this 'simple' cake.

In cooking there is always an element or risk involved, and there is certainly a moral to this story. Two actually. The first moral is that patience is a virtue and it is always better to let a cake cool completely if one wants to avoid this kind of disaster. The second moral is that with a bit of improvisation even the biggest of cake flops can be hidden.

So, a cake baked and a lesson learnt. What more could you ask for?!