Incredible Banana Cake with Walnuts Pecans

Serves 8 in about 1 hour. An oven recipe built around tsp lemon juice and powdered sugar.

Ingredients

• 2 cups ripe bananas (about 4) mashed
• 2 tsp fresh lemon juice
• 3 cups all purpose flour
• ¼ tsp salt
• 1 ½ tsp baking soda
• ¾ cup unsalted butter, softened
• 2 cups sugar
• 3 eggs, room temperature
• 2 ½ tsp vanilla
• 1 ½ cups buttermilk, room temperature
• ½ cup unsalted butter, softened
• 1 8 ounce package cream cheese, softened
• 1 ½ tsp vanilla
• 3 cups powdered sugar
• Chopped walnuts or pecans

Method

1. Warm oven to 275° F.
2. Grease and flour a 9 x 13 inch baking dish, or two 9 inch round cake pans.
3. In a bowl, mash the bananas with a potato masher and mix with the lemon juice. keep it nearby.
4. In a medium bowl, mix together flour, salt, and baking soda. keep it nearby.
5. In a large mixing bowl, cream together butter and sugar until light and fluffy.
6. Beat in eggs, one at a time.
7. Mix in vanilla.
8. Beat in the flour mixture alternately with the buttermilk. Start and end with the flour.
9. Mix in the banana mixture.
10. Tip in the batter into pan/pans and bake for 60-70 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean (for me it takes 70 minutes, but yours might be a different time, as ovens vary).
11. Lift out cake from oven and place pan/pans onto a baking sheet and put into the freezer for about 45 minutes. This makes the cake turn out very moist.
12. Cream the butter and cream cheese together until smooth and creamy.
13. Stir in the vanilla.
14. Tip in powdered sugar 1 cup at a time, with mixer on low speed, and beat until combined, then beat on high speed until frosting is very smooth.
15. Frost cake once it has cooled.
16. Scatter frosted cake with chopped walnuts or pecans.

More dessert ideas are in the dessert collection.