Banana Cake Recipe {Sheet Pan Cake} - Belly Full (2024)

FAQs

What happens if you put too much banana in banana cake? ›

You Use Too Much Banana

Fight the urge to use more banana than called for in your recipe. Using too much banana could make your bread heavy and damp in the center, causing it to appear undercooked and unappealing.

It's important to make sure your bananas are well mashed. If they aren't broken down well enough less moisture is released from the fruit, effecting the texture of your cake. That being said you don't want to blitz it to a banana puree either! A few chunks here and there adds some variety and texture.

The most common reasons a cake sinks in the middle include the following: The pan is too small. There's too much liquid. Opening the oven or moving pans during baking.

Fill the pan until it's two-thirds full, and if there is any remaining batter, fill up a muffin tin. This ensures you get a beautifully risen loaf instead of a potentially flat loaf in a 9×5. Now that you know the importance of pan sizes, it's time to make a loaf of the Best-Ever Banana Bread!

If the peels have gone completely black, you might be thinking it's time to dump them, but bananas are good for much longer than you may think. If you didn't get a chance to freeze the bananas before they ripened, start preheating the oven, because more likely than not, they are perfectly fine to bake with.

Most cakes begin with creaming butter and sugar together. Butter is capable of holding air and the creaming process is when butter traps that air. While baking, that trapped air expands and produces a fluffy cake. No properly creamed butter = no air = no fluffiness.

The most crucial tip? Instead of buying an entire box of cake flour, simply incorporate two tablespoons of cornstarch into 3 1/2 cups of all-purpose flour. This blocks the formation of gluten in the flour, which produces a lighter, fluffier cake.

To make a box cake mix rise higher, try using a smaller pan, adding an extra egg, using milk instead of water, adding baking powder, mixing for longer, using room temperature ingredients, baking at a higher temperature, or using cake strips.

The idea behind this test is you can insert a toothpick or paring knife into the center of the cake to see if the crumb has set. If the tester comes out clean, it's done. If it comes out gummy or with crumbs clinging to it, the cake needs more time in the oven.

Most typical cake recipes call for an oven temperature of 350 degrees. Dense cakes (like pound cakes, bundt cakes, etc) do better at 325 degrees with a longer bake time.

Why won t my banana cake cook in the middle? ›

You incorrectly measured the ingredients.

If you do not measure the ingredients exactly (and just eyeball things) then the liquid-to-dry ratio of the ingredients could be off. Too much liquid can lead to banana bread that sinks in the middle. Of course, an excess amount of dry ingredients can also lead to trouble.

Using a lot of bananas adds excess moisture, and there are two ways to get rid of it. You could either add more flour or increase the baking time. Add a tablespoon of extra flour at a time into the batter and give it a good whisk until its consistency starts to look right: thick but runny enough to fall off a spoon.

When you smash bananas to make a banana bread you end up releasing a lot of PPO which will catalyze the polymerization of the phenols and, therefore, make your bred looks darker then others.

If you purposely or accidentally used baking soda instead of baking powder without making any changes to your recipe, you'll definitely end up with a bitter taste. Remember, baking soda is an alkaline, or base, ingredient that naturally has a bitter taste. Baking powder is a multi-ingredient leavener.

When using unripe bananas, the bread may be denser and have a slightly less moist and tender crumb. The starch in unripe bananas takes longer to break down during baking, resulting in a less soft and sweet texture.

Using a lot of bananas adds excess moisture, and there are two ways to get rid of it. You could either add more flour or increase the baking time. Add a tablespoon of extra flour at a time into the batter and give it a good whisk until its consistency starts to look right: thick but runny enough to fall off a spoon.