Banana and date cake with caramel walnut frosting

(serves 10-12)

Adapted from BBC Good Food

A couple of weeks ago I wanted to make a somewhat healthy cake for our friend's birthday at bible study. We had a couple of super ripe bananas and a big box of dates from Costco that we hadn't gotten through yet, so i decided to see how i could combine this happy duo. I trialled this cake variation of a sticky-date pudding, the caramelised walnuts and icing added that extra crunch and sweetness to this wonderfully soft and moist cake. Super easy to prepare and full of mostly natural sugar :) It took the second go to work out how to make it look a bit more appealing though, mMmm.. caramel frosting goodness!

Prep time: 30 min

Cooking time: 45 min

Ingredients

150g butter, softened

200g self-raising flour

1 tsp cinnamon

100g caster sugar

2 large eggs, beaten

3 T clear honey

2 ripe bananas, mashed

100g pitted dates (approx 12)

Caramel frosting

60g butter

1/2 C (110g) brown sugar

2 T milk

1/3 C (40-60g) icing sugar, sifted
30g chopped walnuts

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 160˚C and prepare a 20cm round baking tin by cutting out a piece of baking paper to fit the bottom, and buttering the sides. 

2. Combine the butter, sugar, flour, cinnamon, with an electric mixer. Beat in the eggs and honey.

Making use of handy honey wedding thank-you gifts!

 3. Mix in the bananas and chopped up dates.

4. Pour the mixture into the tin and bake for 45 minutes, or until a skewer inserted into the middle comes out clean. Cool for 10-15minutes on a cooling rack.

5. When the cake is cooling, prepare the icing by melting the brown sugar, butter and milk together. Slowly bring to just below boiling point. Remove from the heat and stir in the sifted icing sugar until desired consistency.
6. Spread majority of the icing over the cake, then coat the walnuts in the remaining icing and sprinkle over the top of the cake.

7. Dust with icing sugar and serve!