Sunday 25 November 2012

Punky-Monkey Cakes!

Piccoli Torte di Banana e Zucca, con Yogurt e Marmellata di Mirtillo Rosso
Little Banana/Pumpkin Breakfast Cakes with Yogurt & Cranberry Jam


Yes, I know they look like little yellow, edible pug-dogs, but these yummy pumpkin and banana cakes will brighten up your breakfast table and put many smiles on many faces... so don't knock 'em too hard!

As usual- it's one of those, "oh, that banana over there is looking mighty ripe and I also happen to have a slice or two of pumpkin" recipes... in other words- just improvised on the spur of the moment... but that doesn't make the result any less tasty! Basically, I transformed the pancakes I was planning on making into soft, little cup-cakes, which I enjoyed hot, hot, hot from the oven!


So this is how I made them. I started off by dicing the the pumpkin into large chunks and then boiling it in milk with a little vanilla, cinnamon, Stevia to sweeten it (you can use sugar if you wish), a pinch of salt and a little nutmeg. The amount I used was literally just one good handful- not much at all. I used just enough milk to cover the pumpkin and after 6-7 minutes, it was already soft enough to work with... so that's what I did!

I added 3/4 of a banana (I had already nibbled away 1/4 of it whilst the pumpkin was doing its thing!), and mashed it in roughly with a fork- the main reason for this was that the room temperature banana cooled off the hot pumpkin a little- which was handy, as I would soon be adding egg to the mix and did not want it to curdle!

Next, using my mixer, I whizzed together the pumpkin and banana, which soon became a lovely smooth cream, soaking the remaining milk... and by the way... it already smelled wonderful! I added 2 tablespoons of flour, 1 teaspoon of custard powder, 1 egg yolk and a little grated orange zest... then gave that a nice thorough mixing too. I let the batter sit and "do its thing" for 5 minutes and in the meantime, whisked the egg white until it was fluffy and firm. I then carefully folded it into the batter and was then ready to fill my little cake cases! 2-3 Tablespoons of batter for each portion amounted to 8 little cakes in this case, using 1 egg, that chunk of banana and the last slice of pumpkin- and you can't complain at that now, can you?

Into a pre-heated oven they went at 350°F for 20-25 minutes... so easy!

I enjoyed mine on a little plain yogurt with a half-teaspoon of cranberry jam on each one... a light, not too sweet, but oh-so tasty breakfast! So you see- monkeying around can sometimes be fun! And even tasty!

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