Banana Butter Cake (Easy & Moist)

This banana butter cake recipe makes a wonderfully moist and delicious banana cake. Baked in a loaf pan and topped with thin slices of banana, this cake is easy to make and turns out perfect every single time.

This banana butter cake does not require any icing or frosting and is best served plain, but if you like, you can pair it with cream cheese frosting or even buttercream.

This is a small batch recipe, and makes a loaf cake measuring 8 by 4 inches loaf. If you wish to make a bigger cake, double the recipe and bake it in an 8 inches round pan or square cake pan (baking pan).

How To Make

Ingredients

These are the ingredients for this simple and super moist banana butter cake:

• Self-raising flour + baking soda + baking powder + salt
• Soft brown sugar
• Butter
• Egg
• Bananas (mashed)
• Buttermilk
• Vanilla extract

Preparing the bananas

1. Use overripe bananas for best results.
2. Peel the bananas and measure them.
3. Place them in a separate bowl and use a fork to mash them up.
4. Make sure to mash them well and there are not chunks of banana left. Set aside.

Mixing the cake batter

1. In a large bowl (mixing bowl), the butter and brown sugar until light and fluffy with a hand mixer (electric mixer) on medium speed. This should take a good 2 minutes. Scrape the sides of the bowl half way through with a rubber spatula.
2. Next, add in the egg. Beat until all the traces of the egg are no longer visible.
3. Combine flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt in a medium bowl. Sift them or use a hand whisk to mix the ingredients well. You can also sift them as you add them to the cake batter. Fold these with a spatula (by hand) in alternately with the buttermilk, start and ending with the dry ingredients. For this recipe, you can add the flour mixture in 2 batches and all the buttermilk in between those 2 batches. If you are doubling or tripling the recipe, add the dry and wet ingredients in smaller batches.
4. Next, add the vanilla essence
5. And finally fold in the mashed bananas.
6. Pour the banana butter cake batter in a well greased and floured loaf cake pan or a parchment paper lined cake pan measuring 8 by 4 inches. Level the top. Slice about half a banana into thin pieces and place them in row on the levelled cake batter.  

Baking the cake

• Bake the cake in a preheated oven  (at a baking temperature of 175 degrees Celsius) for 40 to 45 minutes. Check to see if the cake is baked at about 35 minutes by poking a cake tester or skewer into the center of the cake. If the skewer or tester comes out without any wet batter sticking to it, the cake is baked and can be removed from the oven.
• Remove the banana butter cake from the oven, let rest in the cake tin for a few minutes and then turn out onto a wire rack. Let the cake cool until it is are only slightly warm to the touch. Wrap the cake in cling wrap and refrigerate to let it cool down completely.
• To serve bring the cake back to room temperature. The cake is best served when it is at room temperature and not cold.

Notes

Wrap and refrigerate the cake after baking

• This is the trick that makes this banana butter cake a super moist cake. Refrigerate the cake while it is still warm for a good 12 hours before frosting it. Other than the buttermilk and generous amount of mashed bananas added to the batter, refrigeration is a key factor.
• That does not mean you can just toss the layers into the fridge and take them out 12 hours later. Make sure to wrap each of the banana butter cake layers tightly in cling wrap so that they do not dry out in the refrigerator. Place them without proper wrapping, and you will end up with a very dry banana cake.

Use overripe bananas

• This cake being a banana cake has bananas as one of its main ingredients. For the best banana butter cake, choose fully ripe bananas. Not only are they easier to be mashed, but they taste so much better too.
• The other point I wish to mention about the bananas in this old fashioned, homemade banana butter cake recipe is the fact that bananas can vary quite substantially in size – at least where I come from. I live in Malaysia, and here, we get a lot of varieties of bananas. And with each variety, the taste differs slightly, and some differ significantly in sizes, sometimes up to 3 times in size. This is why, in my recipe, instead of mentioning the number of bananas to be used, I chose to indicate by their weight. That way, the amount of bananas that get added to the butter cake can be kept to a perfect consistency every single time.
• Nevertheless, I used medium sized bananas for making this banana cake and to make up the 200g of banana indicated in the recipe, I used four and half bananas. The remaining half banana was sliced thin and placed on top of the cake batter (in a row) before baking.

How to Mash the Bananas

• The easiest way to mash bananas is to use a fork. Simply press the bananas to break and mash them and do it in sections, making sure each section is well mashed before you move to the next.
• For best results, the bananas should be mashed fine, or you will end up with chunks of banana in your baked cake.
• If you are using frozen bananas, bring them to room temperature first before mashing them.

Can you frost the cake and what icing goes well with this banana cake?

• You can definitely frost the cake if you like. Generally, cream cheese frosting goes well with this banana cake, and you can also use buttercream or chocolate ganache as alternatives.

Use brown sugar

• This banana butter cake recipe calls for the use with brown sugar instead of white sugar. While most banana cakes use plain white castor sugar, I have chosen to use brown sugar. Brown sugar gives this banana butter cake a tinge of molasses-like taste.
• This adds more depth to the cake flavor and is definitely a better choice compared to plain white castor sugar. 
• Use soft and fine brown sugar instead of the coarse ones.

Buttermilk substitute

• This is a banana cake with buttermilk. You can substitute buttermilk with milk and lemon juice.
• Simply add half teaspoon of lemon juice into 75 ml and let it rest for a few minutes. Use as indicated in the recipe. Remember to double or triple this measurement if you decide to double or triple this moist banana butter cake recipe.

Avoid over baking the banana cake

• This is another factor that will affect the moist texture of this homemade banana butter cake. To avoid overbaking, bake in cake tins with the indicated sizes and check for doneness at least 5 to 10 minutes before the baking time is up by inserting a skewer in the center of the cakes.
• If the skewer comes out without any wet batter sticking to it, the cake is done and should be removed from the oven. Ideally, there should be soft crumbs sticking to the skewer. If the cake is done, the top should spring back when pressed lightly. 

How long with the cake last?

• Given the moist texture of this cake, it can last at room temperature for about 3 to 4 days. If you wisht to keep it longer, keep it refrigerated in an airtight container to prevent it from drying out. Bring the cake back to room temperature before serving.

Like this super moist cake recipe? Here are my other posts and recipes you should check out

• Banana Pound Cake - Easy and Moist
• Instant Coffee Cake with Chocolate Chunks (Easy & Moist)
• Super Moist Vanilla Cake
• Dark Chocolate Banana Cake with Buttermilk (Super Moist!)
• Easy Moist Banana Bread with Oil (No Butter)
• Peanut Butter Banana Chocolate Chip Cookies
• Old Fashioned Lemon Pound Cake

Recipe (Printable)

Here is the printable version of my banana butter cake recipe and while you are at it, don’t miss my recipe notes right below. They contain absolutely useful tips for the making a successful banana cake.

And that’s my banana butter cake recipe for you.

Happy Baking 🙂 🙂