This is, hands down, the BEST banana cake I’ve ever had. It’s soft, moist and rich all at the same time! Once cooled this cake is topped with a totally irresistible lemon cream cheese frosting for a perfect dessert your family will love.
I love a good banana cake, it just reminds me of being a kid because my Grandpa and Grandma made the BEST banana cupcakes. I can still smell them baking in my grandma’s kitchen, waiting impatiently with my sisters.
This cake is reminiscent of my favorite banana cupcakes. It is soft and fluffy and incredibly moist and topped with my favorite ever lemony cream cheese frosting.
As much as I love a fluffy banana cake, I love it even more when it’s topped with an amazing cream cheese frosting! I add in a little bit of lemon zest and lemon juice for extra flavor in my cream cheese frosting but if you prefer, you can leave out the lemon and substitute vanilla.
Regardless of how you top it, once you try this cake, it’ll be your go-to. Every time you have overripe bananas on the counter you’ll want to make this recipe! In fact, I often buy extra bananas to ripen and make this cake!
Tips to ensure a soft moist result:
- Ensure your ingredients are at room temperature (eggs and butter)
- You need the acidity from the lemon juice (& milk) mixture. Subbing in just milk or cream won’t work. (You can use buttermilk in its place if needed).
- When mixing your butter, sugar, eggs and vanilla, beat the mixture until VERY fluffy, almost the consistency of a fluffy buttercream frosting. This should take about 5 minutes.
- When adding the flour mixture you want to mix until just combined. Over-mixing will cause a dense chewy result.
- The cooking time on this cake can vary! Check your cake at 55 minutes, if it isn’t ready, continue cooking until a toothpick comes out clean (this can be up to an additional 20 minutes depending on your oven). The result will be a moist and irresistible banana cake.
Happy Baking!
Ingredients
- 1 ½ cups milk
- 2 ½ tablespoons fresh lemon juice divided
- 1 ⅓ cups mashed bananas about 4 medium bananas
- ⅔ cup unsalted butter softened
- ½ cup brown sugar
- 1 cup granulated sugar
- 3 large eggs
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 3 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 ½ teaspoons baking soda
- ¼ teaspoon salt
Frosting
- 8 ounces cream cheese
- ⅓ cup butter softened
- 1 teaspoon fresh lemon juice or vanilla extract
- 1 ½ teaspoons lemon zest from 1 lemon, optional
- 3-3 ½ cups powdered sugar
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350°F. Grease and flour a 9 x 13 pan.
- Place 1 ½ tablespoons lemon juice in a measuring cup. Top to 1 ½ cups with milk. Set aside.
- Mix together mashed banana with 1 tablespoon lemon juice, set aside.
- Beat together butter, brown and white sugar until combined. Add in eggs one at a time and vanilla. Mix on high until light and fluffy (almost the texture of frosting).
- Combine flour, baking soda and salt in a medium bowl. Alternate adding flour mixture and milk to egg mixture stirring just until combined. (Do not overmix). Fold in bananas. Pour into prepared pan.
- Put into the oven and reduce heat to 300°F. Bake 60 – 70 minutes (see note below) or just until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean (do not over bake).
- Remove from oven and place in the freezer for 45 minutes to make the cake extra moist. Cool completely before frosting.
FROSTING
- Cream together butter & cream cheese until fluffy. Add in lemon zest and juice.
- Add powdered sugar a little at a time until you reach desired consistency. Spread over cooled cake.
Video
Notes
Nutrition Information
Nutrition information provided is an estimate and will vary based on cooking methods and brands of ingredients used.
Course Dessert
Cuisine American© SpendWithPennies.com. Content and photographs are copyright protected. Sharing of this recipe is both encouraged and appreciated. Copying and/or pasting full recipes to any social media is strictly prohibited. Please view my photo use policy here.
This recipe has been retested and updated 11/20/16.
Very slightly adapted from food.com
I want to make banana cupcakes. I make banana muffins all the time but I want a fluffier cake like recipe. Should I use your grandpa’s banana cupcake recipe or your banana cake recipe to make them? Based on the pictures of both recipes your cake looks less dense than the cupcake.
When making banana cupcakes, I usually default to Grandpa’s Banana Cupcakes but you could use either. You will have to let us know which one you prefer Tonya!
I used your banana cake recipe to make cupcakes and they turned out awesome!!! Exactly what I was looking for! Thanks!
So happy to hear that Tonya!
Definitely worth 10 stars!!!! Big hit at my house!
I made this for my daughter’s 1st birthday and everyone enjoyed it so much! Super moist and delicious! Honestly doesn’t even need frosting … I went strawberry picking and have a ton of strawberries I’m thinking of incorporating into this recipe when I make again this weekend. I will try to make an update for how that tastes!
The icing is just great , light and very tasty while the cake tastes more like a banana bread not too sweet but good.
Originally, I thought the idea of lemon in the frosting would be discongruent, but everyone liked it! The cake itself turned out perfect on the first try, banana flavor, light, fluffy, and moist (8×10 ceramic and 8×8 glass). It was gone so fast that I made two more last night. The cake seems a little more dense, it may be that my ratios were a little off or due to using a different pan this time (9×13 glass). I made 2 cakes, hoping to be able to freeze the 2nd one (or at least a portion of it). Has anyone tried freezing? I’m planning to freeze it without the frosting but am interested in anyone else’s experiences.
Hi Jodi, if freezing this cake, we like to freeze it without the frosting. Then thaw, frost, and serve! But it freezes great.
I am practically weeping at how well this cake turned out! I DID switch out the lemon cream cheese because lemon and banana seemed like an inappropriate combination for me. I’d tried my hand at browning butter for the first time earlier in the week and ended up making a browned butter(cream) icing with the finished product so I saved that to use with this cake.
Overall, the recipe is a little more complicated than I like (I’ve spent that past couple years really coming into my own at baking but of course prefer simpler/1 or 2 bowl recipes… However I will say that the finished product was worth the effort. So moist and banana-ey. I was particularly worried I’d accidentally overbaked (I used a timer on my laptop and I think when the computer went into sleep mode the timer was paused, so I checked the cake and pulled it about 10 minutes sooner than the timer was telling me to).
Also added a tbsp or so of cinnamon and a tsp or two of allspice, plus I think I threw 1/2 a banana extra in there just to ensure the flavor.
Sorry, I rambled, however this whole thing was such an extravagant experience for me I can’t help it!
So happy you enjoyed it Stephanie! And your substitutions sound delicious :) Thanks for sharing.
Thh by is Cake was the driest banana cake I have ever made! I did everything on the s
Cake by the instructions provided and it was just like eating cardboard. I am not happy with it and I will go back to my old recipe. Thanks anyway.
Hi in this Sunday afternoon in Ontario Canada, my husband Lorne and I made the best ever banana cake – and you know what ? It was !!
Delish. Thank you. Can’t wait to make it for my family. Sherry
I was really nervous to make this recipe because of all the mixed comments and reviews, but it was totally worth it!
– I followed all of the troubleshooting tips and read the recipe thoroughly before beginning.
– I used vinegar instead of lemon juice to sour the milk and used vanilla instead of lemon in the icing (no lemons to be found at the grocery store).
– I mixed the sugar, butter, eggs, etc. in my kitchen aid mixer, but gently folded in the milk, flour mixture, and bananas using a spatula.
– I was nervous about getting a good rise on this cake, but it doubled in height and was much lighter and moister than a banana bread. I ended up baking the cake for 55 minutes and I’d say that was about perfect for my pan and oven combo.
– I used my glass Pyrex pan, so I cooled the cake on the counter for 15 minutes before moving it to the freezer.
Although this recipe is definitely has more steps than I am used to, it is not complicated as long as you read carefully and follow the directions!
can these be made into cupcakes? if so, how will the baking change?
Hi Ben, to make them into cupcakes fill each cupcake liner ⅔ full and bake for 30 minutes. I would recommend checking them at 20-25 minutes since every oven can cook a little differently. It should make about 30 standard cupcakes
This is amazing I added 1 carrot .
Cake was delicious and so was the icing, BUT NOT TOGETHER.
The lemon in the icing does not pair well with banana. It would
have been better if instead of lemon in the icing I put vanilla extract.
My family ALL agreed.
You can definitely switch up the icing for a vanilla based icing if you prefer Lynda! :)
It’s interesting about the lemon. I made this as a layer cake, made a lemon curd to spread under the lemony frosting on the bottom, put the curd on top with some van/almond cream patisserie on top of that and sliced strawberries on top of that. I used a really thin coating of frosting on the sides.
My daughter, after she had some said, “I wouldn’t believe banana and lemon together would work.” Then she had a second piece and absconded with half the cake when she went home.
Someone above mentioned mango instead of bananas. I thinking MANGO CURD!!! With banana, how good will that be. Such a versatile cake, I guess I’m trying to say. You have to keep everybody from eating it naked, though. (The cake, not the people…)
I don’t have any lemon zest but I do have lemon juice. Do I have to use zest?
You could leave it out if you don’t have it Becky. The frosting will have less of a lemon flavor but still yummy!
Hi. What type of flour do you use? Thanks
We use all-purpose flour for this recipe, Nathalie!
So just to clarify….I”m supposed to put this cake right into the freezer, right out of the oven?? Is that not going to crack my glass baking dish??
Hi Melissa, you can let it cool for 15-20 minutes before transferring to the freezer to ensure. Other readers have also skipped this step with good results.
Can nuts be added to this cake
Hi Robin, I think nuts would be a delicious addition. I would add about ½-1 cup when I fold in the bananas. If you toss the nuts with a little bit of flour before adding to the batter, they won’t sink the bottom.
What type of milk do we use for this?
I usually use whole milk or 2% if I have it.
I made this tonight, even though I shouldn’t have as I didn’t sleep last night. I just wanted to say that I would consider this a “Fool Proof” recipe. I totally forgot to mix the butter in with the sugars and ended up putting baking powder instead of baking soda in with the flour. So I scooped out the b. powder and added the soda. Then I added the butter to the creamed mixture of sugars, vanilla and eggs later than I should have of course! Well I finished the recipe as I was supposed to and even though the batter texture was a bit separated I went ahead and baked it. It turned out great!! DELICIOUS!! I was so pleased and I vow never to bake unless fully rested from now on!!
Oh my goodness Kaki! You had a baking adventure. So glad the end result was a delicious sweet treat for you!
Can I use regular whole milk or does it need to be buttermilk ??
Hi Lala, You need the acidity from the lemon juice (& milk) mixture so subbing in just milk or cream won’t work.
Oh I see. Thank you!
Moist and banana-y. The lemon frosting is perfect with the sweetness of the cake. I would make this cake again.
I didn’t like the measurements of 1/2 tablespoon. Why not 5 teaspoons? For the butter take two 1/2 sticks and cut off 1/3 cup for the frosting. Freezer not big enough for a sheet cake of this size, but with a little re-organizing was able to get it in the fridge which seemed to work.
It is the Best Banana Cake.
Jim
Do you store this in the refrigerator or on the counter at room temp?
Hi Leaha, we usually store it in the fridge and try to leave it at room temp at least 30 min before serving.