Banana Reese's Peanut Butter Cake
It's all part of the celebrations.
Lordie-loo, people, this newsletter will be two years old next month. Along with a slew of good recipes and surprises to look forward to, I am expanding the newsletter to twice a week!
Each week, you’ll continue to get a new recipe of my own creation, but you can also expect a mid-week note from me with links to recipes from my archive, and also, recipes from other sources that I am loving. My plan is to make it all a bit of a delicious hodgepodge of tips, great sources, kitchen history and interesting links.
In the comments, let me know your thoughts, requests, interests, questions about the kitchen past and present, and your favorite kind of pie.
Have Your Cake and Candy, Too
This recipe is the real reason I created this second newsletter.
Ever searching for new and better things to do to banana cake, and desperate for an excuse to by a giant bag of Reese’s peanut butter cup miniatures, I decided to marry them all together.
What a happy wedding. Tender banana cake, studded with pieces of peanut butter cup and frosted with a dark chocolate icing.
There are people out there who think putting chocolate frosting on top of a cake that already has candy in it, is lily-gilding. I don’t think so. (And I don’t think much of such people.) The dark chocolate frosting brings out the banana flavor and makes for a more satisfying chocolate experience if you ask me.
Some Reese’s sprinkled on top gives the eater-to-be a nice visual clue as to the surprise inside. And if you decide not to ice the little darling, then eat it while it’s warm.
I look for reasons to bake this cake. It seems to make everyone (who isn’t allergic to peanuts) very happy.
Banana Peanut Butter Cup Cake
For the Cake, You’ll Need:
2 1/4 cups (270 grams) all-purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
6 ounces (170 grams) unsalted butter, softened
1 1/2 cups (297 grams) granulated sugar
3 large eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
About 2 very ripe, mashed bananas
1/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons (255 grams) sour cream or plain yogurt
1 3/4 cups chopped peanut butter cups (reserve 1/4 cup for sprinkling on the cooled cake)
What You’ll Do:
1. Preheat the oven to 350° F. Butter and flour (or better yet, use non-stick spray that contains both) a smooth Bundt cake pan.
2. In a small bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt and set aside.
3. Using an electric mixer, beat the butter until light. This may take a few minutes. Be patient. Reduce the speed to low and gradually add the sugar. When all the sugar has been added, raise the speed to medium-high and beat the mixture until fluffy. Beat in the eggs, one at a time. Add the vanilla.
4. On low speed, add half the flour mixture alternately with the banana mixture. Add the other half of the flour alternately with the sour cream. Stop the mixer just after the last addition. You do not want to over-mix this. Rubbery cake is not so nice. Even with icing and peanut butter cups in it.
5. Fold in 1 1/2 cups of the peanut butter cups and when just blended, carefully spoon the batter into the Bundt pan.
6. Bake for 45-55 minutes, depending upon your oven. A toothpick stuck in the center of the cake should come out clean. Let cool on a rack for 10-15 minutes. Loosen the edges with a knife before attempting to invert the cake.
7. While the cake is cooling, eat a few of the remaining peanut butter cups you have sitting on the counter, and make the chocolate fudge frosting below:
Very Fudgy Frosting
What You’ll Need:
4 ounces (113 grams) butter, softened
3/4 cup (85 grams) confectioners’ sugar, sifted
1/2 cup + 2 tablespoons (52.5 grams) cocoa powder
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1-2 tablespoon milk
What You’ll Do:
1. Beat the butter until soft and creamy. Add the sugar, and cocoa and vanilla and mix well. The mixture will get sludgy looking. Add 1 tablespoon of milk, blend and add more if necessary to achieve a creamy, frosting-like consistency.
2. Spread the frosting on the cooled cake and decorate with chopped peanut butter cups.
Don’t Be Silly, Be A Smartie!
(And yes, that is a reference to song from “The Producers.” After all the Kanye stuff this week, it’s been on my mind.)
I love to write articles about how things are made. For Nickelodeon magazine, I learned the secrets of everything from basketball manufacture to how candy corn is made. For the New York Times, I wrote about one of Halloween’s most iconic candies, Smarties. Jehosophat, the article is, gulp, seven years old, but! the business is still run by the amazing Dee sisters in New Jersey.
Smarties, A Halloween Favorite, Maintains a Sweet Family Business
Incoming: Pumpkin Biscotti
Yes, brother Paul, if you’ve read this far, I am working on a pumpkin biscotti recipe for you. And everyone else who reads this newsletter. But you inspired it.
The recipe should be up on Saturday morning.
Now to reheat the slab of lasagna I bought at my favorite of New Jersey Italian deli-bakeries, Nicolo’s, to feed my always-hungry teenage kid.
Oh Dear Goddess of All Things Cake! I SO will make this!!!! Decadence all the way and then some