I wrote in my last blog post that everything seemed to be going swimmingly. I had a wonderful weekend. It just so turns out that the luck is continuing! My work week is plodding along steadily, I received a gloriously vanilla-scented parcel from Vanilla Queen, and I just realised that the Cake Bake and Sweets Show is rolling around again this year.

Life is sweet.

I think I know what started all this sweetness.

These banana sundae mini cakes!

I woke up on Saturday completely lacking inspiration (bakers block, in case you were wondering) and these babies just came to me. There was a bunch of bananas ripening hastily, and I knew that these cakes were going to be the answer. I had discussed making popcorn-topped banana sundaes topped with John from Cobs popcorn, and the idea has been sitting at the back of my head for months now.

When I decided I was going to make banana sundae mini cakes, I knew that they’d be crowned with milk chocolate caramel popcorn.

I thoroughly recommend you make these babies. They take a little bit of patience to make, but they’re so worth it – cutting into the teensy cake and removing a mouse-sized slice is ridiculously satisfying.

Banana sundae mini cakes:

Makes 18

Ingredients:

1 cup white sugar
100g butter
¾ cup sour cream
260g mashed banana
2 eggs
1 ½ tsp vanilla
¾ tsp bicarb
1 ½ cups plain flour

Vanilla buttercream:

250g butter
1 tsp vanilla paste
3 cups icing sugar

Chocolate glaze:

125g dark chocolate
60g butter

Optional toppings:

½ cup milk chocolate caramel popcorn
Sprinkles

Grease a 33 x 23 cm baking tray. Line the bottom of it with a rectangle of baking paper. Preheat your oven to 180°C and Cream together the sugar and butter until pale. Add in the sour cream, mashed banana and eggs, and mix, it will be quite wet, so mix carefully to ensue you don’t slop the mixture around. Add in the vanilla, bicarb and flour, then mix.

Pour your batter into your prepared pan and bake for 28-30 minutes, until a skewer inserted into the middle comes out clean, with only a few fat crumbs attached. Set to one side to cool.

While the cake cools, whip the all of the butter cream together until smooth. This is easiest if the butter is at room temperature.

When the cake is cooled completely, turn it out onto a chopping board and grab a scone cutter. Use the scone to cut out as many circles as you can – if you squish them close together, you should get about 18. Take a bread knife and cut each of the rounds in half, horizontally.

Blob half a tablespoon of buttercream onto the bottom halves of the halved rounds, then squash the top down to spread the mixture out. Repeat with all of the halved rounds. Pop in the fridge for ten minutes to set.

Grab the cakes from the fridge and use a pallet knife to spread a thin crumb coat over the sides, then the top of the cakes. Put them in the fridge for a further ten minutes to set.

Spread another thing layer over the cakes. You don’t want things to look too perfect, ideally your icing will have a bit of a textured, ice-creamy look. Return to the fridge.

Pop the butter and dark chocolate in a heatproof bowl over a pan of simmering water and stir until melted. Set to one side to cool, then pop in the fridge for about 15 minutes to thicken.

Grab your cakes and chocolate from the fridge. Grab a teaspoon of chocolate and blob it in the middle of the cake top, then coax it over the edges with the spoon. It should be runny enough that it will form big, appetising chocolate streams, looking like they’re running of the edge.

Top with popcorn (using excess chocolate ganache to hold them together, if need be) and sprinkles.

Devour immediately!

Ps if it’s a hot day, only take these cakes out of the fridge when you’re ready to serve them, as the hot weather over the weekend almost made the chocolate too gooey.

Pps if you don’t have time to make mini cakes, just skip the cutting out step and make this into a tray bake.