Butterless Chocolate Banana Cake

May i present to you, the new baker in our home - my almost-5-year-old son !!
I am so excited about this cake, since its the first time my son insisted on making it 'all by myself' !

I had picked up these colourful sprinkles a while back and he's been mega excited about using it. Last weekend, he insisted that we make a cake and use these sprinkles over them. I asked him if he can help me and he said he wants to make the cake himself...



Ok, I obviously read the recipe and took out all the ingredients, but he did the measuring and mixing and couldnt wait for the cake to get ready...He held the bottle with sprinkles for as long as the cake baked and then was in a hurry to put it all over, so we couldnt wait to even out the cake or layer it with a ganache, like I had planned to...



I got the recipe from JoyOfBaking, used slightly lesser sugar and water..It turned out to be wonderfully soft and moist, despite no butter being added...I am sure this can easily be made without eggs too. I just didnt want to tamper with the recipe for his first experiment...

If you want to give this a shot without eggs, just add another banana and 1/4 cup of oil..

This stores well. I just had the last piece with my tea now and its just as soft...

What you need -

Dry ingredients -
1 3/4 cup sugar
1 3/4 cup flour
3/4 cup cocoa powder
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
a pinch of salt

Wet ingredients -
2 eggs
2 ripe bananas
1/2 cup warm water
1/2 cup milk
1/2 cup oil
1/2 tsp vanilla essence

Topping
sprinkles (optional)

What you do with it -

Pre heat the oven to 180 deg C

Mix in all the dry ingredients in a large bowl and set aside

Mash the bananas and beat the eggs into it
Add all the other wet ingredients and mix well or beat lightly till its all combined well
Pour this into the dry ingredients. Stir together or beat for 2 mins

Grease the pan and dust lightly with some flour
Pour the batter a greased pan and bake in the pre-heated oven for about 45 mins

Top with sprinkles

Keerai Adai

Adai for breakfast is one of my favourites...The best part is that there is no fermenting required, so you easily save up on a good 6-7 hours of time...Its a crispy thick dosa with a lot of lentils and rice and makes for a nice filling breakfast

I had a murungakeerai (drumstick leaves) adai once at a restaurant in Bangalore, served with jaggery, butter and avial and loved the combination.
The drumstick leaves are considered very healthy and tasted awesome in the adai. I had then gone looking for these leaves at the local markets in Bangalore and made a whole lot of adai with it

Since this is something I definately will not find here in Ahmedabad, I decided to substitute it with methi leaves. This worked as an equally nice combination. I guess coriander leaves should also work very well




My son loved the adai with homemade butter and jaggery and I had it with molagapodi and butter, giving in completely to the temptation of the soft white homemade butter...

What you need

1 cup rice
1/2 cup moong dal
1/2 cup chana dal
1/2 cup urad dal
1/2 cup tur dal
1 tsp cumin seeds
3 red chillies
a few curry leaves
a pinch of asafoetida (hing)
1 cup methi leaves
1/2 tsp salt

What you do with it

Soak the rice and the lentils for a minimum of 4 hours
Drain the water and grind along with the cumin seeds, red chillies and curry leaves to a coarse paste
Add as little water as required to make the batter
It need not be smooth like the regular dosa batter
Add hing and salt and chopped methi leaves
Mix well adding a little more water so you can spread it out well
On a hot tava, add a little oil, pour a ladleful of batter in the centre and spread into a nice round shape
Cover for about a minute or two and then flip over
Add a little more oil and remove from heat when done

Serve with butter, jaggery, molagapodi or avial