Saturday 24 March 2012

Tropical cake

mango, pineapple, coconut, cake

I love baking banana bread so when I saw this banana bread tin in America I knew I had to buy it.  As soon as I got home, I bought some bananas to ripen. However, I was too impatient to wait for them to ripen as I was so excited to use this tin! Plus my brother was making an unexpected visit and said if I wanted to bake a cake (he knows me so well!), he would take it with him and share it with his colleagues.  Of course I couldn't say no - I'm always looking for someone to eat my bakes and it was the perfect opportunity to try out my new tin. 

This tin inspired my cake which I made up as I went along. I wanted to use ingredients that I had and that had a tropical feel as that's what this tin says to me. Admittedly, I had to buy the mango and dessicated coconut (as I don't like coconut) but I had everything else at home. 

The cake was moist and flavourful and smelt very tropical.  It's a bit like Forrest Gump's box of chocolates - you never know what you are going to get next. Each bite of the cake had a different taste of the fruits - the first bite, I tasted banana and coconut, then pineapple and then mangoes.  I used a lot of fruit in this cake and I would recommend halving the fruit amount and increasing the flour if you prefer less 'bits' in your cake.  It also made a lot of cake as I managed to get 1 fancy cake as shown above and another medium sized bundt cake. 

I am entering these to simple and in season hosted by Ren from Fabulicious food 



and again (I know!) to my own AlphaBakes hosted by Caroline from Caroline Makes this month as the letter is M .... for mangoes!



PS apologies for the awful lighting in the photos - didn't realise until it was too late to fix!


 my brand new tin 

 banana, coconut milk, pineapple, dessicated coconut and mango 

 love the bright yellow colour and it smelt amazing! 

 adding the white ingredients - coconut milk and dessicated coconut 

 ready to go in the oven 

 hurray it came out of the tin like a dream

 love the detail :)


 'extra' batter which made a mini bundt cake 

 you can see the chunks of fruit in the cake 

An original recipe by bakingaddict 

125mls vegetable oil
200g brown sugar (increase this if you prefer a sweeter bake)
1 banana, mashed
1 mango - peeled and chopped into chunks 
260g pineapple, chopped into chunks (you can also use fresh pineapple)
3 eggs
100g dessicated coconut
250g self raising flour
165mls coconut milk

variations - you can add some spice (nutmeg or cinnamon would go well I think) or some nuts for crunch but reduce the fruit amount otherwise there will be no batter! 


  • Preheat the oven to 180C. 
  • In a large bowl, whisk the oil and sugar.
  • Whisk in the eggs, one at a time until well mixed. 
  • Mix in the yellow fruits - banana, mango and pineapple.
  • Then the white ingredients - the coconut milk and dessicated coconut and mix well.
  • Finally fold in the flour.
  • Pour into prepared cake tin and bake in the oven for approximately 45-55 minutes (large tin) or 30-35 minutes (small tin).
  • The cake should be golden brown and a skewer inserted into the centre should come out clean. 
  • Allow to cool in the tin for a few minutes before turning out to a wire rack to cool completely. 



27 comments:

  1. I LOVE this tin...I want one!! You're always so good at making up recipes too...I think I need to be braver as this sounds delicious!! :-)

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    1. Thanks, I'm getting more confident making up recipes but they don't always work! This is now my favourite tin and I'm so glad I bought it.

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  2. love this cake look amazing and of course love your tin lol
    Yes dear Glass sugar is the same that Icing sugar, sorry

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  3. I LOVE that tin!

    Did you grease or cake release spray it? I do worry about stickage with fancy tins.

    And what a lovely recipe!

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    1. I buttered and floured the tin and it was fine. I'll try cake release spray next time to compare. It's my favourite tin now so I'm sure you'll be seeing more of it :)

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  4. Wow, it turned out so amazing! I bet you're happy you splurged for the tin now! and what a recipe - coconut, pineapple and mango - that's pretty much 3 of my favourite flavours! what a tropical banana bread...hopefully your tropical baking will bring with it some tropical weather!

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    1. Definitely no regrets buying it, I would have regretted it my whole life if I didn't! I think the tropical tin worked with the tropical weather as it's lovely this weekend. So pleased you like the flavours - I had a feeling you would :)

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  5. I must try this cake, i have total tin envy lol

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    1. Do let me know what you think if you do try it.

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  6. Perfect for spring. I love the tin!

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    1. Indeed! I'm very pleased with the tin too :)

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  7. What an amazing tin, I've never seen anything like it before. It definitely deserved a juicy tropical bake. I'll have a slice by the seaside please!

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    1. I know I was so excited when I saw it and so so pleased that I bought it (even tho I was over my budget by the time I saw this tin) How about a cocktail to go with your slice by the seaside? :)

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  8. It looks deliciously moist and I love the colour. I've never used mango in baking before AND I really like the idea. What an amazing tin.

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    1. Thanks! I've never tried baking with magoes either and was worried that it would be mushy but it wasn't. I'll definitely make this again with different variations.

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  9. First let me say, I would gladly nibble on any of your baked goodies. What a lucky brother:)

    That mold is fabulous! You sure did put it to good use, Ros. How do you just "whip" up these thing? I would need to omit the mangos though. They don't like me:)

    Thanks for sharing...

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    1. Thanks for dropping by, you can easily omit the mangoes. I'm just glad the recipe worked as I basically chose what ingredients I wanted and then added the basic sugar, flour, eggs to the mix. Sometimes its a disaster. I think it would still taste good without the mangoes.

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  10. I'm so so so SO Jealous I want that tropical cake in too :) hahaha your brother knows you too well ~ of course you want to make a bake hehe i bet you'll bake at any chance you get! I wish i was living in London too because then I'd never had to bake myself and just eat whatever you make WOO HOO!

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    1. I definitely bake any chance I get and am always looking for willing volunteers to eat the bakes! This tin is now my favourite of all my tins :)

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  11. Love the pan! And it came out beautifully... That's quite an awesome mix of ingredients too - coconut, mango, banana, pineapple - what's not to love?

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    1. Thanks! I'm so pleased it turned out beautifully. I just made up the ingredient list to fit the theme of the pan! :)

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  12. These is an awesome shape cake! Love all the fruits in this cake! Amazing! :)

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    1. Thanks! I'm pleased it all worked out well :)

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  13. What a lovely cake! I love the tin, what a great thing to pick up on your travels! The cake looks really moist and lots of lovely fruit. Thank you so much for linking up to Simple and in Season! Rounded up today xxx

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    1. Brilliant round up as always. The cake was very moist and fruity indeed :)

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