Skip to main content
Dessert

Banana Cake

A moist cake flavored with bananas, baked with baking soda and cream of tartar, topped with whipped cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Vanilla and banana are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,430 recipes. Both carry ethyl isobutyrate, which smells fruity, ethereal. The science ↓

Banana Cake

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare the batter

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. In a bowl, mix baking soda and cream of tartar.

  3. In another bowl, cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.

  4. Add the eggs one at a time, mixing well after each addition.

  5. Gradually add the flour and milk, mixing until smooth.

Bake and make the cream

  1. Pour the batter into prepared cake pans and bake for 25-30 minutes.

  2. Whip the rich cream until light and fluffy, then flavor with sugar and vanilla.

Assemble

  1. Once the cakes are cool, slice them into layers.

  2. Layer the cake with sliced bananas and whipped cream, repeating until all layers are used.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Vanilla + bananatop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,430 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl isobutyrate (fruity, ethereal).

  2. Milk + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,187 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

  3. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  4. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  5. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

Sugar and vanilla barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Add structure and richness as they are beaten into the creamed butter and sugar.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acid in the cream of tartar to produce gas that helps the cake rise.
Cream of tartar
Acidifies the batter so it reacts with baking soda, supporting rise and a tender crumb.
Flour
Forms the structure of the cake once it sets in the oven.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, and creaming it with sugar traps air for a lighter texture.
Sugar
Sweetens the cake and helps it brown while creaming with butter adds air.

The step that matters

Creaming the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Beating air into the butter and sugar creates bubbles that help the cake rise and give it a light texture. Under-creaming leaves a dense cake, while the eggs should be added one at a time so the mixture stays emulsified.

Swap the banana

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cream, egg, sugar, butter, flour, milk, vanilla):

  1. Figfits about as well
  2. Coconutfits about as well
  3. Raisinfits about as well
  4. Bananathe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cream, egg, sugar, butter, flour, milk, vanilla. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

More banana cake recipes

Filling 4 See all 42 →

You might also like

Vanilla Ice CreamVanilla Ice Cream108 recipesBanana FillingBanana Filling16 recipesBanana SherbetBanana Sherbet10 recipesBanana FloatBanana Float9 recipes