Thursday Recipe - Flamingo Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting

This is my interpretation of a recipe in an old Southern Living Annual Recipe collection. The title grabbed me. Who could resist making Hummingbird Cake? I have no idea why it was called that but it sounded delicious and it was fairly easy to put together. And it's delicious. It takes time, but it's worth the wait.

It's full of tropical flavors and makes a wonderful spring dessert. I changed it up a bit, which is why I changed the name. The original called for pecans and lots of sugar. I don't usually like nuts in my baking, so I skipped them and added a pineapple-raspberry filling.

Flamingo Cake

3 - 4 very ripe bananas
1 1/2 c. sugar
1 t. cinnamon
1/2 c. butter, softened
1 t. baking soda
1/2 t. salt
1 t. vanilla
3 eggs
1 20-oz can crushed pineapple, undrained and divided
2 c. white flour
1 c. whole wheat flour
1 T. cornstarch
1/3 c. raspberry jam or preserves
Cream Cheese Frosting
shredded coconut for garnish

Put bananas in the mixing bowl. Add sugar. Beat until bananas are smashed and sugar is mixed in. Add cinnamon, butter, baking soda, salt and vanilla. Mix together. Add eggs. Beat for 1 minute. Add half of the pineapple and the flours. Stir just until mixed.

Divide into baking pans - 3 8-inch round pans or 2 10-inch round pans (springform pans are nice for this because they make it easy to remove the cake). Bake at 350°F for 20-35 minutes, depending on pans. (My 10-inch pans needed 30 minutes.) Let cool in pans.

Meanwhile, place remaining pineapple in a small saucepan. Stir in cornstarch. Cook and stir over medium heat until mixture thickens and boils. Boil and stir one minute. Set aside to cool.

Once cake and filling are cool, make the frosting, then assemble the cake as follows:
Place one layer on a plate. Spread with jam and pineapple filling (use half at a time if you have three layers, otherwise spread it all on the first layer). Top with the second cake layer. Frost top and sides with cream cheese frosting. Sprinkle with coconut.

I'm not the best at decorating and I skipped the coconut on this one.

DO NOT EAT YET. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least six hours. This lets the cake flavors blend and the frosting and filling set.

Remove from refrigerator and serve chilled. Garnish with strawberries, raspberries, coconut, fresh pineapple, or ice cream. Be sure to refrigerate any leftovers.

Cream Cheese Frosting

1/2 c. butter, softened
1 8-oz package regular cream cheese at room temperature
1/2 t. vanilla
1/2 t. almond flavoring
3 T. milk
2 - 3 c. powdered sugar

Cream butter and cream cheese until very light and fluffy, about 5 minutes. Add vanilla, almond flavoring, and milk a little at a time, beating well after each addition. Mixture should be very soft and creamy. Add powdered sugar until mixture is of a spreading consistency. Beat for another 5 minutes until very fluffy. It will be a very soft frosting.