Cream the butter and brown sugar together. Mix in the bananas and eggs. Mix the flour, baking powder and spices separately and slowly add to the creamed mixture. Add the whisky and nuts (and the golden raisins if you insist on ruining it). Pour into an ungreased cake pan (the one I use is approximately 12 X 9 inches). Bake at 350°F for about 75 minutes. This cake can probably be enjoyed without icing, but I like it with just a plain white icing.

This recipe would probably yield a perfectly tasty (but possibly a bit dry) cake without the whisky, but the use of and choice of whisky has a profound effect on the flavor of this cake. Being a very rich and heavy cake, it's not something I'll ever make often enough to try out lots of alternatives. If you don't mind the expense, however, I recommend a single malt Scotch such as Highland Park. It seems like a damn waste of good Scotch, but I've used it in this recipe for the same reason I prefer Scotch over American whiskies in general--it just tastes better. No one buys cheap whiskey for its flavor, they buy it to get drunk, and since most of the alcohol gets baked out of the cake, you may as well opt for flavor.

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