KITK: Banana Bread, Banana Cake, and a new Banana Icing recipe
For this “Kids in the Kitchen” baking adventure, I made the actual cake and the kids helped with the icing when they got home from school…
Avery ices our banana cake!
I have actually been baking the exact same Banana Bread since 1998! I was given the recipe at a parenting program way back when I was pregnant with Harmony. It’s a really super easy banana bread to make, and over the years I’ve added other ingredients to mix it up a little and experiment with new tastes. It tastes so fabulous with blueberries, strawberries or chocolate chips! It’s a very “kid friendly recipe” and kids of any age can help with different parts, like mushing up the bananas (they can’t really mess that up other than being a bit messy!), mixing it all up, or tossing in some of the extra ingredients.
Even though we’ve relied on this “stand by” recipe for over a decade, I was still tempted to try out this new recipe for Banana Cake that I found on a new Live Journal Community, “Amanda Bakes”. I loved that it was more of a cake than a bread, because I’d tried to turn my banana bread into cakes over the years with limited success (even with chocolate chips and chocolate icing, it was not quite cakey enough).
So this week, I tried out the Banana Cake and it was delicious! I think the cinnamon really helps add to the cakey flavour.
New banana cake recipe - mmm, cinnamon.
My daughter said it reminded her of a Carrot Cake. I had wanted to add white chocolate chips to the whole cake, but when I went to find the two bags of them I knew I had, both were almost empty! Riiiiight… I’d forgotten that my DD had been on a “sweet stealing” kick last year. I had thought she’d only swiped the regular chocolate chips (in a bulk-sized bag from Costco that kept getting mysteriously lighter), but it appeared she’d been into the mini bags as well. There were about a dozen white chips in one bag (probably the reason I’d bought the 2nd bag was noticing I was low in the first), but in the other bad there were only THREE!
So I ended up making 1 cake plus a few mini muffins. The mini muffins had the white chocolate chips in their batter, but only ended up with an average of 3 chips each. I’m considering making DD buy me a new bag of white chocolate chips (especially since it’s a small bag unlike the large bulk bag). Or maybe we’ll take another trip to Bulk Barn. We started shopping there to save $ and it’s been pretty cool so far. They have so much there!
Anyways, back to banana bread… and cake, and icing! For the new banana cake recipe, you can check out the link, but I will include the recipe for our basic banana bread and our newly invented icing below:
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Banana Icing:
* 1/2 cup butter, softened
* 2 cups icing sugar
* 2 tablespoons milk
* 1 teaspoon vanilla
* 1/4 teaspoon banana flavouring
* a few drops of yellow food colouring
Directions: In a medium bowl, start with the soft butter. Add icing sugar and blend until smooth as possible, adding liquid ingredients as you go to moisten the icing mixture. If the icing needs thinning, add more milk. If it needs thickening, add more icing sugar. Once prepared, spread over banana cake/bread with a spatula.
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“Ridiculously Simple” Banana Bread:
* 1 & 1/4 cups flour
* 1 tsp baking soda
* 1 cup sugar
* 2 eggs
* 1/2 cup oil
* 2 overripe bananas, mushed
Directions:Preheat over to 350 degrees (F). Combine all wet ingredients in a large bowl. In a second bowl, combine flour, baking soda, and sugar. Add dry ingredients to wet ingredients and blend well (by hand or mixer). Pour into loaf pan. Bake for 1 hour.
Variations: Make it into muffins and reduce the baking time to 20-25 minutes. You can also add fresh or frozen fruit such as blueberries and strawberries or chocolate chips.
I’d love to hear if anyone tries out the banana icing! Happy baking and stay tuned for more “Kids in the Kitchen” entries to come! 
June 10 2010 03:01 pm | KidsInTheKitchen and domestic engineering and family and pics
June 10th, 2010 at 3:05 pm
Great job!! I lovelovelove that you had the kids in the kitchen with you!! And your frosting is divine!! Great idea!
Blessings-
Amanda
June 10th, 2010 at 3:48 pm
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June 11th, 2010 at 8:00 am
@ Amanda ~ thanks! it goes along beautifully with that yummy cake! Thanks for the recipe! Yes, it’s great when the kids are old enough to help along in the kitchen (and when their help becomes actually helpful instead of just messy!).