Hummingbird Cake

Nope, not donuts again, though Ah Girl would love it if they were. These are 'Hummingbird cakes'. I realised that when my mom told me that some bakes she bought from her usual trips to the bakery taste good, I am tempted to make or replicate a healthier version for her. Being more health conscious due to her discomfort, food/bread and cakes out there are deemed to be too salty/sweet/oily for her. One day, she asked me to try out this cake she bought from a bakery at Takashimaya. She liked the taste and asked me to try to decipher the ingredients used. Knowing the name, I cheated and 'Googled' it. I found the recipe documented at this site.

I put off baking this cake till tonight. These 2 weeks have been trying, work load and deadlines are driving me nuts. I'm so stressed up that I have this nagging headache for 3 days. I needed something to take my mind off work for a while, to get a moment of sanity. Last Sunday, my mom bought Hummingbird cake again (I'm beginning to love the name), she even gave me her stash of pecans (squirrel or what? Ahahah..). Thus, I have no reason not to try out the recipe for her.

Keeping her preferences in mind, I reduced the amount of sugar and oil used in the original recipe. I used only 1/3 of the recipe as the full recipe yields too big a portion for us. I used my method to mix the cake since my mom prefers a lighter cake. Also, I did not make the frosting. For those who are interested in the original recipe and method used, please click on the site linked above.

Let's decipher this Hummingbird Cake.

Ingredients (yields 24 mini cakes)
140g Cake Flour
2 tsp Baking Powder
1/8 tsp Baking Soda
1/2 tsp Ground Cinnamon

*Sift together 2x

1 Egg
70g Fine Sugar
1/2 tsp Vanilla Essence
1/8 tsp Salt
40g Corn Oil

130g Mashed Bananas
80g Crushed Canned Pineapples (I cut them up instead)
20g Pineapple Syrup (from can)
50g Pecans (toasted and chopped)

Method
1) In a bowl, using a mixer, whisk egg till pale and fluffy. Add sugar gradually and whisk till thick. Add in vanilla essence and salt. Add oil gradually and whisk till incorporated.

2) Add in mashed bananas, pineapples, syrup and pecans to the egg batter. Fold in the flour till well combined. Scoop the batter into 2 mini donut trays, about 80% full.

3) Bake at 170 deg.C for 15 minutes or till skewer comes clean.

*Note : I used the donuts trays as I didn't want to confine the trays to just bake donuts. Also, the ones bought at Takashimaya are baked using small bundt tins. However, my bakes are smaller than the ones sold.

**Note : I would probably double the recipe and bake with a 7 inch round tin next time round if mom's review is good.

This is how it looks inside. Spongy and soft. Springs right back when pressed.



I don't know about you, but I can't resist doing this when I have round objects on hand. :D



Something I like about this cake/recipe is that it uses pecans instead of the usual pairing of walnuts and bananas. Sometimes, walnuts have this slight bitter aftertaste due to the skin. Using pecans do not have this problem at all. Do give this cake a try. It's absolutely lovely! Oopps.. self brag again.. ahahah...

Hopefully, by end of this week, I still have my sanity...それじゃ～～

*After note : Still need to adjust the amount of sugar. The bananas I bought were very sweet. I remembered to try out the pineapples and syrup but forgot to taste the bananas before I baked. Tsk...