I don’t have much to say today – one of my meds wasn’t delivered and the lack of it is affecting my sleep, so I’m almost sleep-posting here – so here’s the promised banana fruit cake recipe instead.

It really is super easy, and very forgiving: generally when baking you need to be quite accurate with your measurements, but this cake works even if you have a bit more or less of any ingredient. It’s dairy free, too, which will be helpful to some people.

Ingredients

• 2 – 3 very ripe bananas (somewhere between 200 and 300g peeled weight)
• 3 large free-range eggs (or 2 large eggs, or 3 medium eggs, plus a bit of milk [non-dairy if you need / like])
• 100g soft light brown sugar (if you have less banana, or your bananas aren’t really ripe, add a bit extra)
• 150ml sunflower or vegetable oil
• 275g white self-raising flour
• 1 tsp ground mixed spice (or more if you prefer a spicier cake: I usually use 2 to 2 and a half)
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 2 generous handfuls of sultanas
• Flaked almonds (optional)

Method

Preheat the oven to gas mark 4 (or whatever the equivalent temperature is for an electric oven).

In an oven-proof bowl, mash the bananas with a fork until completely disintegrated.

Add all the other ingredients except the flaked almonds and fold together until there is no dry flour and you have cake mix. Smooth the top if necessary and sprinkle with the flaked almonds if you’re using them.

Put into the oven and bake until risen, golden brown, and a skewer or knife stabbed into the cake comes out clean. (If the top starts to get too dark and the cake isn’t cooked inside, cover it with a bit of foil so it doesn’t burn.)

And that’s it. You can try to take the cake out of the baking dish if you like, but I generally just cut slices from the dish. It’s good warm with ice cream, or cold with a cup of coffee.

Enjoy!

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In other news, I finally got approved for Universal Credit, more than six months after I applied. Hooray for that.