Banana Caramel Upside-down Cake - with photos

[alioop]

BANANA CARAMEL UPSIDE-DOWN CAKE

Sauce:
50g unsalted butter
55g brown sugar
60ml maple syrup (or can use golden syrup)
3-4 bananas, sliced (in rounds, or can slice longways if preferred)

Cake:
230g caster sugar
100g unsalted butter (softened)
4 eggs
1tsp vanilla extract
155g plain flour
1tsp baking powder
pinch of salt


Preheat oven to 180 degrees C.  Line a 23cm springform tin with baking paper and lightly grease.
To make the sauce (will become the topping), place the butterfly in the TM bowl and add the butter, sugar and maple syrup.  Cook 5 min at temp 80, speed 2-3 until sugar is dissolved.  Pour the hot caramel into the lined tin and arrange the sliced bananas over the base of the tin.  Scrape the TM bowl well (no need to clean).  To make the cake (keep butterfly in place), place the butter and caster sugar in the TM bowl and cream at speed 3-4 (do not exceed speed 4!) for up to 1 min, stopping occasionally to scrape sides down a few times.  Add eggs one at a time, beating 5 sec at speed 4, after each addition.  Then add vanilla, flour, baking powder and salt.  Beat for 5-10 sec, speed 4 until combined.  Spoon the batter evenly over the bananas and caramel and smooth top gently with a spatula.
Place the cake in the oven on a baking tray to catch any escaping caramel and bake for 35-40 min, or until a skewer inserted into middle of the cake comes out clean.  Remove from the oven and leave in the tin for 5 min to cool slightly.  Transfer to a large plate (by placing plate upside down on cake tin and flipping both over).
Can be served warm with icecream or also delicious cold with cream.  This recipe could also be made with Granny smith apples.

Tips:  This is a very sweet cake.  When cold, sometimes the caramel can go crispy in places along the edges of the cake (yum).  Reheats pretty well.
First pic below is the bananas arranged on top of caramel (the cake batter then goes on top of this).

members' comments

sourpuss - Again I have tried one of the older posted recipes and I have to say with this one : THANK YOU, Alioop, this is SUCH a wonderful banana cake recipe. Cos you said it was very sweet, I cut down a fair bit on the sugar in the cake part and it was still sweet but very good. I can't remember when I last saw a cake disappear so rapidly at a work morning tea!! - good thing, as it meant I only got to have one small slice and wasn't able to make a pig of myself!! Will definitely make again.

faffa - I think substituting half of the butter and sugar with apple sauce (per brazens posting on here) would work really well with this cake and would also cut down on the sweetness. I love that idea and use it in every cake now.

[alioop]

One more photo 

[JulieO]

Looks lovely Alioop 

[trudy]

Looks great.

Trudy

[Very Happy Jan]

Yum!! This forum is not good for my diet.   Or is it that I just keep looking at the wrong recipes 

[CreamPuff63]

  I'm with you VHJ -- whenever I see something with angelic ingredients, I tend to bypass it and look for something devilish along the lines of biscuits, cakes, desserts...

[cookie1]

Another calorie laden food. Yippee, that's my sort of food. This looks really nice and after all it does have bananas in it and they have potassium in them. :

[alioop]

lol Good one cookie1 - think we could add some zucchini in there as well guys??

Luckily, I have a DH with a very sweet tooth and amazing metabolism so I usually only get 1-2 pieces of any baking before it disappears!  Will have to pace myself with the baking soon or even he may start to gain weight!

[cookie1]

That's the trouble in this house. I HAVE to watch my weight   carefully, DD is ok but keeps an eye on what she eats. DH used to be fine then his 61 year old brother had massive heart attacks and strokes at the end of last year so he decided to lose a few kilos and did so very quickly (makes you sick! ) and now he won't eat all the sweet things and left overs. Therefore the freezer eats well, but there comes times when we have to eat from that too so we can fit more in. Fortunately DD work will eat lots of the sweet things that are left over.

[Thermomixer]

Looks great - sure it tastes great too 

cookie1 - I watch my weight - it just keeps going up - funny that the more I eat the faster it goes up - very rarely goes down 

[JulieO]

Thermomixer, you crack me up.   

[cookie1]

Happy people always have a bit of meat on their bones. 

[Nay-nay]

Oh yum!! I love recipes that use maple syrup!! I was goin to get some friends to pick me up a huge bottle from Canada on a recent trip but they said it was just as expensive over there as here in Aussie Land!! But maple syrup is just one thing you can not skimp on - none of that cheap sugar water in my house!!  /color]

[sourpuss]

Again I have tried one of the older posted recipes, and I have to say with this one : THANK YOU, Alioop, this is SUCH a wonderful banana cake recipe. Cos you said it was very sweet, I cut down a fair bit on the sugar in the cake part, and it was still sweet, but very good. I can't remember when I last saw a cake disappear so rapidly a ta work morning tea!! - good thing, as it meant I only got to have one small slice and wasn't able to make a pig of myself!! Will definitely make again . Heidemarie

[JulieO]

Sourpuss, thankyou for bumping this up, a good reminder to make it and I will cut down on the sugar too.