Turmeric-Banana Snacking Cake

Recipe by

Asha Loupy

Serves

8 to 10

Difficulty

Beginner

Photo by:

Melati Citrawireja

Excerpted from The Diaspora Spice Co. Cookbook. These are just a few of the deeply personal recipes that tell the story of our farm partners, their kitchens, and the spices they grow. Order your copy here!

When building out the dessert section of this book, we knew we could either go heavy on tradition, or we could just let ourselves be inspired by ingredients on each farm and really focus on our “what grows together, goes together” thesis. We realized that whilst there are many recipes and books out there that can go deep into the nerdy techniques of desi mithais and sweets, our role is to introduce our community to the fresh, seasonal, and spice-forward, and so this cake was born.

I think of this cake as an ode to Prabhu Kasaraneni, our incredible Pragati Turmeric farmer, who is really the person that inspired this entire business. His commitment to regenerative agriculture, responsible land stewardship, and most importantly, growing the world’s most delicious turmeric is hard to overstate. The family farm grows an indigenous variety of peanuts that find their way into every tadka, coconut palms line the borders of each plot, and three different banana varieties provide supplementary income when turmeric season is done. On one of my earlier sourcing trips, Prabhu’s mum Siva Nagendramma Kasaraneni made us a fantastic banana cake that used coconut oil and was topped with toasted coconut shavings. Asha has done what Asha does and cranked it up a few notches to this golden delicious cake with an ingenious caramelized coconut-peanut topping.

Ingredients

2¼ cups (270 grams) all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon baking soda
1¼ teaspoons Pragati Turmeric
¾ cup (144 grams) granulated sugar
¼ cup (48 grams) light or dark brown sugar
Zest of 1 large orange
2 very ripe bananas, mashed well (about 1 cup)
⅔ cup (158 milliliters) neutral oil, such as canola
⅓ cup (79 milliliters) fresh orange juice
½ cup (120 grams) full-fat sour cream
2 large eggs, at room temperature
1½ teaspoons vanilla extract
¾ teaspoon fine sea salt
1 cup (96 grams) shaved, dried, unsweetened coconut flakes
⅔ cup roasted, salted peanuts
2 tablespoons demerara sugar

Methods

Preheat the oven to 350°F. Line a 9 x 2” round cake pan with parchment paper and set aside.
Combine 2¼ cups all-purpose flour, 1 teaspoon baking powder, ½ teaspoon baking soda, and 1¼ teaspoons ground turmeric in a bowl, mix well, and set aside.
Place ¾ cup granulated sugar, ¼ cup light or dark brown sugar, and the zest of 1 large orange in a large bowl, and rub the citrus zest into the sugar with your fingertips until the mixture looks like wet sand, 1 to 3 minutes. Add 2 mashed, very ripe bananas, ⅔ cup neutral oil, ⅓ cup fresh orange juice, ½ cup full-fat sour cream, 2 large eggs, 1½ teaspoons vanilla extract, and ¾ teaspoon fine sea salt, and whisk until smooth and most of the sugar has dissolved, 1 to 4 minutes. Add the dry ingredients and gently fold in until fully incorporated, being careful not to overmix.
Scoop half of the batter into the prepared pan and spread into an even layer. Sprinkle with ⅓ cup roasted, salted peanuts, ½ cup shaved, dried, unsweetened coconut flakes, and 1 tablespoon demerara sugar, then dollop the remaining batter on top, gently spreading it into an even layer. Sprinkle the top with the remaining ⅓ cup roasted, salted peanuts, ½ cup shaved, dried, unsweetened coconut flakes, and 1 tablespoon demerara sugar. Bake until deeply golden on top and a toothpick comes out clean when inserted into the center of the cake, 50 to 60 minutes.
Cool for 1 hour in the pan. To remove the cake from the pan, run a paring knife around the edge of the pan, place a plate over the top, and flip. Remove the parchment paper from the bottom of the cake, place the plate you want to serve the cake on on the bottom of the cake and flip to be rightside up. Serve slightly warm (the cake will still be warm after an hour) or at room temperature alongside a cup of jaggery chai. Store any leftovers in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 3 days.

Notes: If you are avoiding peanuts for any reason, you can swap in cashew nuts, walnuts, pecans, or even almonds.

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