Chocolate and banana loaf

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Whenever I step into the kitchen on a weekend and get ready to bake, once I’ve decided on a recipe and I’m starting to collect things out the cupboard, it always seems that I’ve forgotten to buy one thing. Pretty much everything on the recipes I have are always in my storecupboard, but more often than not, I’ve forgotten to buy the butter. I remember to pick up eggs on the food shop, but for some reason, butter seems to elude me.

That happened last Sunday, which was annoying because I was set to bake some banana chocolate chip muffins because I had some very ripe bananas that needed using. Enter, a new recipe. I found this on BBC goodfood, and it was perfect because it uses oil instead of butter. I love chocolate cake, graham loves banana loaf. Ding ding! A chocolate banana loaf cake is automatically a winner.

It’s an easy recipe, the only thing slightly tricky is separating the eggs. I definitely find having a stand mixer makes whisking up egg whites into stiff peaks a whole lot easier than without, so actually the recipe was a doddle. It cooked perfectly at the time stated and I’ve been eating it after lunch all week. The oil gives it a very moist texture and although you can’t taste the banana as much, it stops the cake being too rich. I think I prefer lighter sponges with butter, but I think this is a great alternative!

Recipe from BBC goodfood

175g very ripe bananas

100ml sunflower oil

175g SR flour

175g caster sugar

1/2 tsp bicarb

3 eggs (2 separated)

4tbsp cocoa powder

50ml milk

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Preheat oven to 140 fan

Mix dry ingredients together. Mash bananas and stir in one whole egg and 2 yolks, followed by the oil and milk. Beat egg whites until stiff. Stir the banana mix into the dry ingredients & add a 1/4 of the egg whites, then fold in the rest. Scrape into tin.

Bake for 10-15 minutes

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