Old Fashioned Spice Cake with Caramel Glaze

I have a confession to make.  It does involve bananas, like my last confession, but only indirectly.  It will also lead to how this cake was born.  A week or so ago, I fed my family muffins and milk for dinner.  That’s it.  Everyone survived.  My 14 year old son did give me a questioning look when I told him that’s what we were having.  I offered that he could fix an egg for himself, but he downed 4 or 5 muffins in just a few minutes and seemed satisfied. 

The recipe I used for the muffins came from Pioneer Woman’s Tasty Kitchen.   I had some bananas I needed to use, so I searched Tasty Kitchen for recipes that included bananas.  I found one for Apple Banana Muffins, which I altered to the point of barely recognizable to the original recipe.  They tasted wonderful, but had a strange texture.

Then while grocery shopping, I spied a Spice Cake Mix and new I wanted to combine the flavors of the muffins into a cake and Spice Cake was the perfect base.  I used a recipe from The Cake Mix Dr. as a guide, but altered it pretty heavily.  I did use her recipe for the Caramel Glaze.

Here’s what you’ll need for the cake:

• Spice Cake Mix
• 1 cup chunky applesauce
• 1/2 cup buttermilk (or milk soured with 1 tsp. of vinegar
• 1 stick of butter, softened but not melted
• 1 tsp. vanilla
• 2 eggs
• 2 mashed bananas

Grease and flour a bundt pan (or use that great Baker’s Joy cooking spray).   Heat the oven to 350 degrees.

Put the cake mix and all the other ingredients in a large mixer bowl, and mix until well blended.  Pour into the cake pan and bake for 50-55 minutes.  Cool the cake in the pan for 20 minutes and then loosen it with a butter knife run around the edge.  Dump out onto a plate to finish cooling.

For the Caramel Glaze:

• 3 Tbs. butter
• 3 Tbs. brown sugar
• 3 Tbs. white sugar
• 3 Tbs. heavy whipping cream
• 1/2 tsp. vanilla

Put all the ingredients into a saucepan and bring it to a boil over medium heat.  Boil it for 1 minute.  Remove from heat and spoon it over the cake.

The applesauce and banana made this cake both flavorful and very moist.  The caramel glaze made a perfect combo. 

Bundt cakes always remind me of the movie, My Big Fat Greek Wedding.