Nigella Lawson's Chocolate Banana Cake

No matter how rhapsodic I wax about my city, there are times when it's imperative to just get out. The apartment walls feel like they're inching closer every day, the city's patina looks more like filth than age-old wisdom, and my ability to deal with a full workload, dates with friends and Ben, and the semblance of an inner life flies completely out the window. As luck would have it, an escape lies just up the Hudson River. From time to time, when life in the big city overwhelms us, or when someone's birthday needs celebrating, we pack up our bags, zip to Grand Central and ride up along the river to Beacon, where Ben's mother lives.

From the back bedroom that we claimed this weekend, I could lie awake at night and hear the distant whistle of the train, raising some ancient wanderlust, and in the morning faint chirping readied me for the day. Leisurely meals around the dining table, rousing games of Uno!, and a sunny walk down Main Street where I alternately kept my eyes peeled for Pete Seeger and dreamt of renting out one of the many storefronts to open a bakery or restaurant, were some of the best parts of the weekend. But best of all was celebrating Ben's birthday with his family (though one crucial Spaniard was missing).

Nigella Lawson's article on easy baking in the New York Times several months ago proffered up a recipe for a cocoa-flavored banana cake covered with chocolate icing, fusing two of Ben's favorite things - bananas and chocolate. With high hopes after other Nigella successes in my kitchen, I figured I'd found the perfect cake for Ben, and so I packed up my springform, a bloc of Valrhona and a clutch of browning bananas before our ride upstate. It must have been Murphy's Law that on such an occasion, I was totally disappointed by the results.

The cake's crumb was dry in some spots and leaden with wet bananas in others (looking more like fruitcake than birthday cake). The cocoa flavor was masked by the large amount of mashed bananas and the rustic texture of the cake clashed entirely with the elegant and fruity icing (of which there was far too much - I poured the smooth and glossy leftovers into a pitcher to eat over ice cream). I kicked myself for not making Molly's well-tested and spectacular banana cake instead. Ben and the others, being both darlings and sweethearts, ate their slices gamely (even taking seconds, with vanilla ice cream valiantly gussying up each plate) and Ben's mother asked for the recipe, so it wasn't an unmitigated disaster. But I'd never make it again.

I don't agree with Nigella that anyone can be proficient as a baker - and perhaps that's where the problem lies. Nigella created the recipes in that article for novice bakers - and I think she did them a disservice. Baking is more difficult than making a stew - it does require more effort, a lighter touch, a bit of reverence in the kitchen. Why should novices settle for instant gratification rather than delicious results (and though she calls this cake sophisticated, I beg to differ)? Becoming a good baker takes practice, failure, and run-ins with bad recipes. One newspaper article that promises spectacular results with a dollop of sour cream and a devil-may-care attitude isn't going to do the trick.

Chocolate Banana Cake
Yield: 10 to 12 servings

For the cake:
3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) butter
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 3/4 cups flour
2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 cup best-quality cocoa
1 cup sugar
2/3 cup sour cream
1 1/2 cups mashed banana (about 4 very ripe bananas)
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
3 large eggs
Pinch of salt

For the icing:
1/2 cup heavy cream
4 ounces semisweet chocolate, finely chopped
2 tablespoons light corn syrup

1. For cake: heat oven to 325 degrees. Oil or spray a 9-inch springform cake pan and set aside. In a large saucepan over low heat, melt butter with olive oil. Remove pan from heat.

2. Add flour, baking powder, baking soda, cocoa and sugar. Mix well. Add sour cream and mashed banana, and whisk to combine. In a small bowl or pitcher, whisk together vanilla extract, eggs and salt. Add to saucepan and whisk until smooth. Pour into cake pan.

3. Bake until a cake tester inserted into center comes out clean, about 45 minutes. Allow cake to cool on a rack for about 15 minutes, then remove springform and allow cake to cool completely before icing.

4. For icing: In a medium saucepan, combine cream, chocolate and corn syrup. Place over low heat, stirring gently with a spatula to avoid creating air bubbles, until mixture is very smooth. Place cake on a stand or a plate and spread icing over it with spatula.

Comments

[Lindy]

Lovely post. It was relaxing to read about unwinding in a delightful sounding place.

I do agree about baking being demanding. It is not so easy to make a good cake. Either that, or I'm just more fussy about sweet things than savory.

I just don't really like most cakes, muffins, and store pies, but I think a lot of people do. I am always surprised how really awful cakes that people set out in the lunchroom get scarfed up, for example.

[Julie]

Happy Birthday to Ben!

Banana chocolate cake sounds like a wonderful birhtday cake choice. Too bad this one didn't work.

Cooking and baking disappointments really are disappointing. Especially if it's an occasion.

[Molly]

Oh, I want to come to Beacon too! Your weekend sounds *wonderful.* I'm with Lindy - even reading about it was relaxing. And happy, happy, happy to Ben!

xo

P.S. Though I am awfully partial to my banana cake with chocolate ganache, I wonder if Nigella's recipe might be salvaged. My friend Jenny has made it a few times, and when I was lucky enough to get a slice, it was wonderful. I wonder if she might have whirred the banana in a blender or food processor, rather than simply mashing it? If you could start with a nice, smooth banana puree - no chunks or lumps, no matter how tiny - maybe you would wind up with a more even-textured, less fruitcake-y result? Maybe?

[Jessika]

As an obsessive baker I must say I haven't had much success with any of Nigella Lawson's baking recipes. Nor have I been sufficiently impressed to try more than a few cakes before giving up, deciding reading about them and then finding another recipe elsewhere would do better.
Oh and about making mistakes - how about the cake for a swiss jelly roll that literally came oozing out of the oven?! Weird, but I did learn a thing or two from the experience.

[Joyce]

I completely agree! As much as i love Nigella i find that she's way too careless and nonchalant in her baking directions. i think more information/guidance is needed for the novice baker. too bad this recipe didn't work.

[shauna]

Happy Birthday to Ben! That's all that matters. Still, I sympathize. It's so disappointing when a recipe doesn't turn out on a special occasion. I'm certain that he'll forgive you. But can you forgive Nigella?

[Ben]

Well I, for one, was touched by the gesture, and thought the cake delicious in its own right. I mean the chocolate...the bananas...it was delicious! Thanks for a great birthday (and cake) Lui, you're the best!

[Luisa]

Lindy - Thank you! Sometimes I wonder if I'm just too much of a perfectionist: my standards for baked goods just seem to be higher. Doesn't that sound awful? But I think it might be true.

Julie - I agree. Luckily, it's a small enough problem to have had ;)

Molly - you will have to join us sometime! It is so peaceful and beautiful up there. I threaten to leave the city and move there and only part of me is joking. The part that keeps getting smaller and smaller. I think a banana puree absolutely sounds like it could make a difference, but I've moved on already...I want to make your banana cake next!

Jessika - an oozing swiss roll? That sounds infuriating. I've heard that Nigella's baking recipes are not always reliable, but I've had such good results from her other recipes that I figured this wouldn't happen to me. I have a copy of How To Be A Domestic Goddess that I'm embarrassed to admit I have not baked from ONCE yet. I'll have to try it out and see how it goes.

Joyce - it's a good thing she's so charming otherwise...

Shauna - I can definitely forgive Nigella. She's just so...groovy. I simply can't hold it against her, not as long as she's providing me with other, more successful recipes.

Ben - thanks, babycakes. ;)

[dixieday]

I agree! I love reading Nigella, but her recipes have never worked for me, especially the desserts. She does the dump-it-all-together method way too often, when I think it only works with certain simple oil-based cakes. In this case, I bet it would be a pretty good cake IF you used a standard butter-cake method instead. I would, however, ditch the olive oil, and cut back to 2 eggs, 1 cup of mashed banana, and 1 tsp vanilla, to reduce gloopiness. I would up the cocoa to 1/3 cup, or just leave it out altogether and add some chopped bittersweet chocolate instead--I think banana/chocolate works best when there's a distinction between the two flavors. SO: Cream softened butter with sugar, beat in eggs and vanilla. Beat mashed banana and sour cream together in a separate bowl. Sift dry ingredients, and add them alternately in thirds with banana and sour cream. Bake as directed.

[Rose-Anne]

Oh, I'm so glad I read this post before making Nigella's Chocolate Banana Cake. I have had the recipe in my binder forever, and I have these grand plans of actually making it someday...but if I do, I will take the sage advice from Molly in the comments and buzz the bananas to smoothness in the food processor.

But since you pointed out ANOTHER banana cake within your essay, now I'm torn: which one should I make first? Oh, decisions, decisions!

By the way, your blog is lovely, Luisa. I've been perusing your recipe index and enjoying it very much.

[Doris Tan]

Hi, my kids love banana chocolate cakes. So I tried this recipe taken from Nigella Lawson. While the cake turned out fine, the frosting seem a problem - it is too watery. Is something missing from the recipe eg icing sugar? Please advise. Thank you -Doris Tan from Singapore