This sunday it will be Morther’s Day here in Portugal, and I found it appropriate to celebrate with a special cake. It is inspired by the american recipe of the hummingbird cake, with a portuguese twist.
It is a walnut and banana cake, with chopped pineapple bits and spiced with cinnammon. Many different flavors in total harmony. It is one of those cakes that leave a wonderful smell around the kitchen once they are out of the oven.
The filling is cream cheese – the original recipe, being american, usually has quite a lot of sugar. To adapt it to our portuguese palate I reduced the sugar in my version, which brings out the cream cheese taste and vanilla aroma.
Here is my hummingbird cake, one of my top 5 party cakes!
Hummingbird Cake
wallnut, pineapple and banana, with creamy cheese filling
Ingredientes
Walnut Cake
- 100 g walnuts
- 280 g pineapple
- 3 to 4 ripe bananas
- 3 eggs
- 250 ml vegetable oil
- 1 tsp vanilla essence
- 220 g brown sugar
- 360 g all-purpose flour
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 1 tsp table salt
- 2 tsp cinnammon powder
Cream Cheese Filling
- 270 g cream cheese
- 120 g powdered sugar
- 1 tsp vanilla essence
- 200 ml heavy cream
Decoration
- 50 g walnuts
- edible flowers
Preparação
Walnut Cake
- Preheat the oven to 180 º C.
- Coarsely chop the walnuts and pineapple. Squish the bananas with a fork. Set these ingredients aside.
- In a bowl, mix the eggs, oil and vanilla with a hand whisker.
- Separately, mix the sugar, flour, salt, baking soda and cinnamon.
- Slowly add the dry ingredients to the egg mixture, folding them with a spatula. The result will be quite thick.
- Lastly, mix in the walnuts, pineapple and banana. The juice from the fruits will make the mixture a little lighter and pourable.
- Distribute the dough across 3 round cake pans of about 18 cm in diameter, previously greased.
- Bake for about 20 to 25 minutes, or until a skewer inserted in the center of the cakes comes out dry.
- Let the cakes cool down a little and the remove them from the pans.
Cream Cheese Filling
- In the mixer, beat the cream cheese, sugar and vanilla until creamy.
- Pour in the heavy cream and beat for a few more minutes. The mixture will first turn liquid, then slowly thicken until you have a smooth, creamy filling.
- Cover with cling wrap and refrigerate until it is time to assemble the cake.
Assembling e Decorating
- Place the first cake layer on a serving plate. Spread about 1/3 of the filling and smoothen it over with a spatula.
- Repeat the previous step for the next two layers. Smoothen over the sides of the cake, "naked cake" style.
- Decorate the top of the cake with chopped walnuts and edible flowers.
