Best Banana Cake with Caramel Sauce and Chocolate Buttercream - Gluten Free

There is always a perfect excuse to make a banana cake when you have just over ripe bananas in the fruit bowl. And i promise you cannot go wrong with this amazing banana cake. It is always light and fluffy yet moist and hides the gluten free taste very very well! Using both caramel sauce with vanilla butter cream and chocolate on the top adds decadence to the cake, this fab combo will never let you down. The cake was made for my work, Gatting catering, for morning tea and didn't take long for it to all be gone! ENJOY 
(excuse the bad photos of the baking process, was made late at night and the lighting in the kitchen isn't the bet for photos at night xx)

Ingredients

1 cup Caster Sugar
100g butter, softened
3 eggs
3 bananas, mashed with a fork
½ cup low fat milk
1/2 tsp baking soda
150ml plain yoghurt
1 1/2 cups plain flour

½ ground almonds

3 tsp baking powder

Method

Preheat oven to 160°C conventional or 140ºC fan-forced.
Grease a 2x 21 cm round springform tin and line base with baking paper. 
Beat softened butter till light and creamy. Add the caster sugar and vanilla and beat till well combined. Add eggs on at a time, beating well after each addition until pale and creamy. 

Add the mashed bananas, the yoghurt, milk (dissolve baking soda into the milk), flour, ground almonds and baking powder. Mix until just combined and pour into the prepared cake tins. 

Bake for 20-25 minutes until the cakes are cooked in the middle and just pulling away from the edges of the tin (insert a skewer into the centre, if it comes out clean it is cooked). Cool in tin for 5 minutes then release the sides and cool on a wire rack. 

Butter cream:

100g butter, softened 

4 cups icing sugar

3 tablespoon milk

2 tsp vanilla essence 

3 tablespoon cup cocoa + more milk

1/2 can Caramel sauce (i used nestle top and fill caramel)

Beat butter in an electric mixer until light and creamy. Add vanilla, icing sugar and milk, beat on a low speed till combined then beat on a hight speed for 2-3 minutes or until fully and pale. 

Pipe / spread half of this vanilla icing to one of the cakes. This will be the icing in the middle of the cake. Again pipe or spread the caramel sauce over the top of the vanilla icing. Add the second cake on top. 

Add the 3 tablespoon of cocoa to the remaining icing in the mixture, you may need a splash of milk to soften the icing. Pipe or spread this over the top of the cake. Add sprinkles and a flower on top to finish it!

Salted Caramel Baked Cheesecake -Gluten Free

Now that exams are over i can finally get back in the kitchen and this is what i came up with. You can never go wrong with this baked New York cheesecake. It is PERFECT every time and so easy to make. And with the addition of salted caramel on the top, can you get any more decadent?? The base is made with ginger nuts and coconut which adds to the richness and perfection of this dessert.  ENJOY 

Crust:

150 grams) of gluten free ginger nuts in crumbs

1/4 cup ground almonds

1/2 cup unsalted butter, melted

1/4 cup threaded coconut

Filling

500g cream cheese, room temperature (use full fat, not reduced or fat free cream cheese)

1/2 cup (200 grams) granulated white sugar

1 1/2 tablespoons gluten free flour (healtheries baking mix is what i use)

3 eggs, room temperature

3 tablesppons cream

2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

For Crust:

In a medium sized bowl combine the crumbs, coconut, and melted butter. Pour into a square cake tin and refrigerate while you make the filling.

For Filling:

Preheat oven to 170 degrees C. In bowl of your electric mixer place the cream cheese, sugar, and flour. Beat on medium speed until smooth (about 2 minutes), scraping down the bowl as needed.

Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well (about 30 seconds) after each addition. Scrape down the sides of the bowl. Add the whipping cream, lemon zest, vanilla extract and beat until incorporated.

Remove the crust from the refrigerator and pour in the filling. Bake for 15 minutes, then reduce oven to 120'c and bake for another 40mins or until firm but the centre of the cheesecakes firm yet may still wobble a little in the centre.

Remove from oven and place on a wire rack. 

Caramel sauce:

Ingredients:

1 cup (200g) granulated sugar

6 Tablespoons (90g) salted butter, cut up into 6 pieces*

1/2 cup (120ml) heavy cream*

1 teaspoon salt

Directions:

Heat granulated sugar in a medium saucepan over medium heat, stirring constantly with a rubber spatula. Sugar will form clumps and eventually melt into a thick brown, amber-colored liquid as you continue to stir. Be careful not to burn.

Once sugar is completely melted, immediately add the butter. Be careful in this step because the caramel will bubble rapidly when the butter is added. Stir the butter into the caramel until it is completely melted, about 2-3 minutes.

Very slowly, drizzle in 1/2 cup of heavy cream. Since the heavy cream is colder than the caramel, the mixture will rapidly bubble and/or splatter when added. Allow the mixture to boil for 1 minute. It will rise in the pan as it boils.

Remove from heat and stir in 1 teaspoon of salt. Allow to cool down before using.

Cover the caramel tightly and store for up to 2 weeks in the refrigerator. Warm the caramel up for a few seconds before using in a recipe.