Banana Cake (Keto\Paleo, grain free, dairy free, refined sugar free, gluten free]

We have been experimenting at home with other sorts of flours and keto recipes in an attempt to cut some of the bad things out of our diet! Aldi had different sorts of flours on special so it was a good way to be able to experiment with a few different types of flour at not such a large cost :)

Banana flour is the closest to 'normal' flour that i can find for everyday baking, it smells and tastes not at all like banana, while i do like banana cake and bread i didn't want everything to taste like it! It is also really good for you, it is high in resistant starch [good for regulating blood sugar and supporting digestive health], is high in magnesium, potassium and zinc and helps lower cholesterol. It also contains 5HTP, the precursor to Serotonin :)

i used to cook cakes quite a lot but haven't in a while so i was looking forward to trying, it was quite different than most cakes I've cooked in the past so i wasn't sure how it was going to turn out, especially as the mix was a lot more firmer than usual so i expected it to be dry but was pleasantly surprised :)

Replacements for the 'usuals' in my cake recipes were
⦁ instead of using self raising flour i used banana flour
⦁ instead of using butter i used coconut oil
⦁ instead of using white sugar i used honey

The Recipe!

Ingredients

1 cup: green banana flour
1 tsp: bicarbonate soda
1 tsp: vanilla extract
1/2 cup: coconut oil
1/3 cup: almond milk [or coconut milk]
1/4 cup: honey [or 1/3 cup coconut sugar]
1: egg
2: mashed bananas [the more ripe the better!]

Steps:

⦁ Preheat oven to 160c
⦁ Grease cake pan with coconut oil [i use a Pyrex dish]
⦁ Add all ingredients in bowl [i do mine in no particular order]
⦁ Mix all ingredients with mixer until they are combined
⦁ Spoon into cake tin
⦁ Cook in oven at 160C for 35-40 minutes [if you pierce it with a skewer or knife and it comes out clean, that's when its done]
⦁ Allow to cool on bench

[Side note - i found the cake mix a little dry so i ended up putting in another generous splash of almond milk after id mixed it the first time, i think it helped!]

I was very pleased with the results and surprised at how soft and springy it was! Generally i wait for the cake to cool but this one was started on pretty-much as soon as it left the oven, half of it gone in ten minutes! :) I also think the pan i used was a little bit big and that's why it didn't raise as much as i was expecting, next time ill try a smaller one.

Now i have a good grain free cake base, i can build from here and start adding things like cacao and fruit, the sky is the limit!! All of the ingredients can be found at Aldi/Woollies so they aren't hard to find, or too overly expensive [but as they say, pay the farmer now or pay the doctor later!] so i look forward to doing more baking! :)

Kenj xx