… last week I had the depressing task of having to go into the dark nightmare that is the nespresso store in Piccadilly… there are so many things wrong with this place it’s a little hard to know where to start but it begins with the dark, moody atmosphere, runs through the excessively rude but beautiful staff and ends with the awful fact that you have to join a dumb-ass club just to purchase overly-expensive capsules of coffee for some dumb-ass machine that your dear friends gave you one christmas…
I promise you i’m going somewhere with this rant… I just need to step away from the computer and scream a little first…
… so when the goodly people at big cup little cup got in touch with the promise of an alternative coffee pod I quite literally grabbed them by the scruff and shouted YES!… these little pods are almost identical to the originals, less expensive and work perfectly in the machine I have and to be honest I even think the coffee tastes better purely because of the joy of not having to have bought them from that dark place…
coffee chocolate banana cake with a coffee chocolate-clotted cream ganache
you’ll be pleased to know I finally cracked that oven at the London flat with this gorgeous little cake… I think it was a temperature / timing issue, basically I guess I need a little more patience!… this is an adaptation of my simplest banana loaf recipe with the addition of coffee and chocolate with a naughty but luscious ganache icing.
for the cake
8oz self-raising flour
4oz butter
4oz sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 tablespoon cocoa powder
1 shot of espresso coffee
2 ripe bananas
2 large free-range eggs – beaten
for the icing
150g butter
100g good quality dark chocolate
1 shot of espresso coffee
100ml Rodda’s clotted cream
grease and line a loaf tin or a 20cm loose-bottom cake tin and pre-heat the oven to 180C
place all the cake ingredients into a bowl and beat together with an electric whisk, pour into the cake tin and bake for 45mins or until golden and risen, take out of the oven and set aside until completely cool
for the ganache, melt the butter and chocolate together then stir in the coffee before beating in the cream until the icing is light and fluffy then slather all over the cake
eat and of course, enjoy!
That cake looks AMAZING. And ranting is good.
The ridiculous cost of the little capsules is the main reason why we didn't buy one of those coffee machines. Even if they taste amazing, there are some things that are just too expensive. We calculated that for the cost of using them for a year we could eat out at our favourite restaurant at least twice.
Your cake looks fabulous, love the flavour combination. The next time I have some spare bananas I will be making this!
I love the perhaps unintentional smiley face this cake has in the icing! I have never been to the Nespresso shop but it sounds awful. Have you ever been to the Abercrombie one in Saville Row? So dark and dismal.
Glad you found a lovely alternative. 🙂
So glad to hear you found a good alternative to having to go to that nasty store!! Funny how those little things can just take the joy out of life 🙂
The cake looks and sounds absolutely delectable!!
Clotted cream ganache – heaven! Only problem is I don't think it'd make it as far as the cake (mumbles with mouth full of ganache)! Vohn x
Ooh Dom, this cake sounds fabulous – just love the clotted cream ganache. As far as I can see those coffee machines just take up valuable space. Never seen the point of them, but then I'm not a coffee drinker 😉
It's just as well my gall-bladder is long gone, because it would have been in convulsions reading about this fabulous cake! Glad to read that you found an alternative coffee for your machine – well done. The Nespresso shop sounds like it's an Outer Ring of Hell 😀
Lovely cake, but I would have to find an alternative name for it:)
Love that first paragraph and rants in general. Nice to find an alternative. Great looking cake.
So glad you have mastered that oven – nothing worse when things get burnt or undercooked especially when its not your fault. Looks great too – wonderful ganache.
Groan; that shop is the PITS. Had to go there for my Boss once (in my lunch break from Bloomsbury, gee thanks, just cos he had one of those dumbass machines). Hate it hate it. Now about that cake; sounds delish, coffee cake being approximately the best think on earth. Xx
yes yes yes please! I love everything about this cake especially the ganache. I'm one of those weird people who don't drink coffee but love coffee based desserts.
The Nespresso shop sounds awful – but that type of place is depressingly common these days. Customer Service seems to be a lost art! Your cake, on the other hand…
Oh oh this looks so dark and devilishly delicious! Love anything coffee flavoured and that frosting sounds amazing with clotted cream in, think would end up just making it and eating with a spoon!!