Chocolate and Banana Cake

I'm still on the hunt for a banana cake recipe that actually works. I think I may have found one though...

Here's the latest attempt! I've made two so far using this recipe and BOTH have worked. No soggy mass in the middle, no burnt crust, hurrah!

I'm guessing (I can't quite remember) that it was in a sainsbury's magazine or recipe book or something. I photographed the page to see if the recipe worked. Here it is.

• 175g plain flour
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp bicarb of soda
• 125g unsalted butter, melted
• 150g golden caster sugar
• 2 large eggs
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 275g very ripe bananas (weighed without skin: approx 3 small bananas), mashed
• 150g dark chocolate, chopped (the recipe said cut into 1/2cm chunks but I used about a third of that amount, and chopped it very finely because Ben doesn't like big lumps of chocolate in his cake. He likes the flavour though.)

1. Preheat oven to 180C (160C fan) Gas 4. Grease and line a 2lb loaf tin with baking parchment.
2. In a bowl, mix together the flour, baking powder and bicarb.
3. In a large bowl, beat together the melted butter and caster sugar until blended. Beat in the eggs one at a time, then beat in the vanilla extract and banana.
4. Gradually add the flour mixture, mixing well after each addition, then stir through the chopped chocolate. Pour into the loaf tin and bake on the middle shelf of the oven for 50 minutes to 1 hour. When it's cooked a skewer (or knife) inserted into the centre should come out clean, apart from melted chocolate. Leave in the tin to cool.

(NB I don't trust my oven, so I cooked it at 170C or so for an hour then turned the temp down to 160C for another half an hour. It was cooked by then. The previous cake I cooked at 180C for an hour and it wasn't cooked in the middle, and the top was crunchy so the temp got turned down for another half hour again.)

Casserole

Makes enough to feed 2, three times. Freezes well.

Ingredients
1lb beef chuck steak, diced (or about 1lb of whatever meat you fancy)
1 brown onion, diced
3 big carrots, peeled and roughly chopped
1 smallish swede, peeled and chopped
2 parsnips, peeled and chopped
3 or 4 medium turnips, peeled and chopped smallish
A handful mushrooms, quartered if big
(A cooking apple, peeled and diced if using pork)
Water
Seasoning (salt, pepper, dried mixed herbs)
Gravy granules

Useful to use a big hob-to-oven casserole dish if you have one, otherwise use a big frying pan/wok and work in batches.

Turn oven to about 170C or equivalent.

Fry the onion off gently on a medium heat, about 5 minutes. Turn the heat up and add the meat, season well, and cook quickly browning on all sides as quickly as possible to seal the juices in. Turn the heat off, add all the rest of the chopped veg except the mushrooms (and except the apples, if using) and mix up. Add water to just cover the veg, add the mushrooms and more seasoning if wanted.

Cover with foil and a lid, and transfer to the oven to cook slowly for at least 3 hours.


About 20 minutes before you want to serve, turn the oven up to 200C, take the casserole out, uncover, add enough gravy granules as if you were making about 3 pints of gravy (lots!) stir well, return to oven and add dumplings if you want.