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
Well it’s in the oven but it was so incredibly dry and I even added melted butter and more milk. I was pressing it into the pan like clay! I’m so annoyed. Wasted all those ingredients and doubt that dry play Dough was going to make a decent cake! If it comes out by some miracle to be good I will eat my words …and the cake I’ve been craving!
The batter for this cake is definitely pourable, I’ve made it many times over. If you were having to press the mixture like clay (even after adding butter and milk) I am thinking maybe the measurements were off.
Can’t wait to try it
This is a dense cake and will take longer to bake in some ovens. I use buttermilk. Immediately after removing from the oven, place directly in the freezer for 45 minutes. This will make the cake unbelievably moist. Yummy recipe.
Hi, I made the totally irreducible banana cake……bloody horrible to say the least, it was like a brick! I don’t understand why you turn the oven down, mine came out heavy and dense and I followed the instructions to the letter! Will not be saving or recommending this recipe sorry!
Should have said “irresistible” sorry
I’m sorry it didn’t work out for you, we’ve made it several times and it always comes out moist and delicious. If you don’t turn down the oven, the cake will become overcooked.
Such a shame, as I followed the recipe exactly as written and mine came out PERFECT. Please double check your steps as this is such an incredible recipe!! From one Karen to another, please give it another go.
I am excited to try this cake! I have never baked a cake that you reduce the oven temp. So does this really work ok? Also can you 1/2 the recipe, as it is only my husband & i
Yes it definitely works well. I would suggest baking the whole cake as directed and freezing half of it once baked for a later date.
I just made this cake. It is absolutely divine! It is everything that I thought it would be. DELICIOUS! thanks for posting!
I’m so glad you loved it Shelly!
I just made this last night and it was DELICIOUS! It’s light and fluffy and the frosting is amazing!!! I absolutely love lemons so I added more than what was called for and it turned out so good!
I’m so glad you loved it Venie!
HI! I can’t wait to try this recipe. I just know that my banana loving family will devour this. I just want to let you know there is a little spelling error in your recipe where it says lemon zest “(form 1 lemon)” should be “from”…(in the icing part) Just thought you would like to know. Thank you for the recipe!
Thank you so much for letting me know, i’ve updated it! :) Enjoy the recipe!
I can’t wait to try this recipe. Just want to make sure about the temp. I saw that there were some baking it at 275 degree but the instructions say to preheat oven to 350 then reduce to 300 ??
The temperature in the recipe is correct. I used to cook it at a lower temperature however many readers were having trouble with the results. The recipe was retested several times and updated.
Just made this cake it is it delicious!! I was a little worried it would have a strong lemon flavor but it doesn’t. The cake came out moist and just perfect. The frosting is to die for! So unbelievably good! I had three bananas on hand so I went with that and used them up.
I saved this recipe since I will definitely make it again! I was looking for an excuse to use my new Nordic Ware cake pan when I came across this. Thanks so much for posting this recipe.
Yay! We are so glad that you enjoyed the recipe!
Holly, this icing is awesome!!! Just like I knew it would be.
I had success with the cake this time–since I put on my high-powered reading goggles. :)
I just tried this! Was initially quite skeptical as this recipe calls for a lot of flour! Was worried the cake would turn out dense and heavy like some others commented. But to my surprise, it came out very very fluffy, soft and moist! The only modification I made was I reduced the sugar for both frosting and cake batter. Will definitely make this again and again! Thanks for sharing!!
I’m so glad you enjoyed it Elaine!
It doesn’t say when to add the milk and lemon juice, but I folded it in after the bananas.
It is added in step 5.
If I made this in 2 – 8″ round cakes how long should I bake it for?
I haven’t tried this in 8″ pans so I can’t say for sure but I start checking them at about 35 minutes to test for doneness.
I really can’t wait to try plus enjoy the great thing’s I will be making. Plus try some new thing’s.
Omg the best ever I made this and I couldn’t stay away from it. Thank you so much for sharing
I’m so glad you loved it Marie! :)
I made this cake last night following the instructions to a T. It came out great. My husband who likes both banana and lemon loved it. I plan on sharing it with my parents and in-laws. I don’t have very much experience with baking or cooking so if I were to add some nuts to it next time what do you think would be an appropriate amount to add?
I would suggest adding about 1 cup. If you toss the nuts with a little bit of flour before adding to the batter, they won’t sink the the bottom. :) Enjoy!
Thank you for the tip:)
You’re welcome, enjoy Becky!
Look so good
I’m a traitor to our family recipe but this banana cake is the very best! Thanks for sharing. It’s a keeper!
I’m so glad you loved it!
I agree with the previous reviewer from 12/3/2016 – although it tastes really wonderful, the cake was very heavy and dense. This is probably a result of the 3 cups of flour, baking soda, and 3 eggs. The cooking time is also very low. The icing was heavenly and while I don’t like the density of the cake, I’ll probably make changes in the future.
What in ounces is the equivalent to a cup of flour