Banana Brown Sugar Cinnamon Chocolate Crumb Cake

Posted by Kejia:

Phew! That title was a long one. This crumb cake is crazily good. Trust me. The banana cake is so moist and crumbly you cannot get enough. You'll literally want to keep eating it! (Uh, no, I did not finish the entire cake *looks around sheepishly*) The streusel topping, oh man, don't even get me started on that. It gives the cake a slight crunch, and provides it with two strong flavors: chocolate and cinnamon. If you've never tried the combination of cinnamon and chocolate, you're really missing out! Go to your kitchen now and bake this cake! The two flavors complement each other so well, and neither overpowers the other in this recipe. Also, let's not forget the brown sugar in the streusel. It will give the cake a whole new depth of flavor, as compared to using white sugar.

But that's not even the best part. This streusel is layered in between the cake batter, and put on top of the cake batter again before it goes into the oven. When you unravel and cut the beautiful cake, you'll find that the streusel found in between the cake is all melty and gooey, while the streusel at the top turns crunchy and so, so, so irresistible. I just want to stuff my face into this cake and live my life being a banana/chocolate/cinnamon lady. 

I took this recipe from Sally's Baking Addiction, and man, do I love her!!! I trust her and her recipes so much! I've made her funfetti cupcakes here last year, and boy were they pretty good! (They were pretty, and good). Do give her blog a visit as you can really learn a lot about all the different ingredients and techniques there. :-)

Recipe from Sally's Baking Addiction

Ingredients (cake):

190g plain flour 

1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

3/4 teaspoon baking soda

3/4 teaspoon baking powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

75g unsalted butter at room temperature

100g granulated sugar 

1 large egg

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 and 1/2 cups mashed banana, very ripe (about 3 large bananas)

60g yogurt*

*I did not have any yogurt on hand, and used milk instead. The resulting cake still turned out extremely moist and crumbly, but I'm sure it would be even better if you used yogurt. :-)

Ingredients (streusel):

1 tablespoon ground cinnamon

50g light brown sugar

135g chocolate chips (I used dark, but feel free to use any kind!) 

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350ºF/180ºC. Prepare a 8x8in baking pan by coating it with nonstick spray or butter.

2. In a medium bowl, combine the flour, cinnamon, baking soda, baking powder, and salt together. 

3. Using a mixer (paddle attachment), beat the butter on high speed till creamy, about 1 minute. 

4. Switch the mixer to medium speed and beat in the sugar until combined. 

5. Beat in the egg and the vanilla extract. Don't forget to scrape the sides of the bowl!

6. Add the mashed banana and yogurt and turn the mixer on high and beat until creamy, about 1 minute.

7. Turn the mixer off and pour the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients. Turn the mixer on low and beat until combined. Do not overmix!

8. Make the streusel by combining the streusel ingredients in a bowl.

9. Layer half of the batter into the prepared baking pan. Top with half of the streusel. Repeat with the rest of the batter and streusel. 

10. Bake for 40-50 minutes, covering the cake with aluminum foil after 25 minutes the prevent over-browning. Bake until the center is baked through, where a skewer inserted comes out clean.

11. Allow to cool for 10 minutes before cutting. Done! :-) 

Give this banana cake (+ long string of streusel ingredients) a try! It is so easy to make as well! You will really not regret it. Like really. Just look at #datcrumb. Don't tell me you have ZERO inclinations to bake this. 

Love,
Kejia