Hummingbird Bundt Cake – Sally’s Baking Habit

March 1, 2024

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With its signature flavors of banana, pineapple, pecans, and spice, this hummingbird Bundt cake will fly your tastebuds off to someplace heat and sunny. High with a cinnamon-spiced cream cheese icing and extra toasted pecans for a cake that may disappear as rapidly because the chicken it’s named after. 😉

There are many improbable recipes on the market for hummingbird cake, and so they’re all fairly related. I tailored this Bundt cake variation from Southern Residing‘s ever-popular recipe. It has all the primary parts of the basic hummingbird layer cake:

Banana
Pineapple
Toasted pecans
Just a little spice
Cream cheese icing

…however in Bundt kind. This can be a tremendous plush cake with tons of textures and flavors to like (and minimal adorning required). Right here is my hummingbird layer cake should you ever wish to attempt it, too!

FAQ: Why Is It Known as Hummingbird Cake?

After I first started making this cake from scratch, I used to be inquisitive about its identify and origins. The cake taste originated in Jamaica. A model of the recipe was revealed by Southern Residing journal within the late Seventies, which led to the cake’s recognition within the American South. Now hummingbird cake is also known as a Southern basic. And as for its identify, the cake was named for Jamaica’s nationwide chicken!

Hummingbird Bundt Cake Elements:

ingredients on counter including pineapple, banana, oil, pecans, vanilla, eggs, sour cream, and sugars.

Pecans: Toast them first. It makes a world of distinction, belief me! I at all times suggest this for carrot cake, too. You’ll use some within the batter and the remainder as garnish on high.
Flour: All-purpose flour is the bottom of this cake.
Baking Soda + Baking Powder: We’re utilizing each leaveners right here, for double-duty to raise up this naturally heavy cake.
Cinnamon + Allspice: These heat spices pair fantastically with the banana and pineapple.
Salt: Just a little salt balances the candy.
Eggs (from chickens, not hummingbirds!): Eggs bind all of the substances collectively.
Vegetable Oil: A neutral-tasting oil makes this cake splendidly moist whereas letting its predominant flavors shine.
Bitter Cream: Bitter cream lightens up the crumb of this cake, so it isn’t overly dense.
Granulated Sugar + Brown Sugar: A mixture of each sugars sweetens the cake.
Vanilla: Taste-enhancer extraordinaire!
Bananas: You need the super-ripe, brown and spotty ones such as you use for banana cake. You can even use thawed, beforehand frozen bananas. See The right way to Freeze & Thaw Bananas for Baking.
Pineapple + Juice: You should utilize contemporary or canned pineapple on this cake. Finely chop it, and embody a bit pineapple juice within the batter, too.

Behind the Recipe Testing

After making at the very least half a dozen hummingbird Bundt desserts, my group and I are very proud of the ultimate consequence. After I began creating this recipe, I checked out numerous different bakers’ recipes for hummingbird cake, in addition to my very own hummingbird cake recipe. For probably the most half, the recipes that exist on-line for the layer cake are all fairly related. Listed here are the 4 notable modifications I made for this Bundt cake variation, and why:

Much less banana: Our early makes an attempt got here out tasting type of like banana bread, with some pineapple in it. Whereas clearly I like banana bread, the banana taste was overpowering the whole lot else on this cake. Utilizing equal quantities of banana, pineapple, and pecans within the batter leads to a extra balanced taste profile, with no single taste hogging the highlight.
Chopped pineapple as an alternative of crushed: Most hummingbird cake recipes name for a can of crushed pineapple, however I favor to cut it up myself. This fashion you may management how massive you need the items to be, and select whether or not you begin with contemporary pineapple, canned slices, or chunks/tidbits dimension. A pair spoonfuls of juice go within the batter, too, for much more moisture.
Lowered the sugar: Nearly all of recipes appear to name for two cups of white sugar within the batter, however my style testers and I believed this made the cake approach too candy. There’s numerous pure sweetness coming from the pineapple and banana, so I diminished the quantity of sugar. I additionally use some brown sugar, for a bit further moisture and that heat molasses taste brown sugar supplies (which pairs so properly with the spice taste).
Added bitter cream: This was a late addition within the recipe testing course of, and my group and I might actually style the distinction! Bundt desserts are usually fairly dense, and bitter cream serves to loosen up the crumb.

I like to make use of pineapple chunks. Finely chop them on a chopping board. You should utilize canned or contemporary:

mashed banana and pineapple chunks in a glass bowl.

The batter is thick and textured. Use a Bundt pan that holds 10 to 12 cups of batter, reminiscent of this one or this one. As a result of Bundt cake pans differ a lot in depth and form, the bake time will differ. I like to recommend you start checking it at 50 minutes. It is going to probably want extra time, so proceed checking each 3 minutes or so. My hummingbird Bundt desserts all took about 58 minutes.

pecan, pineapple, and banana cake batter in glass bowl and shown again in a Bundt pan.

pineapple and banana Bundt cake in pan with yellow linen.

Cinnamon-Spiced Cream Cheese Icing

To get the gorgeous drippy look you see pictured right here, beat collectively equal components softened cream cheese and butter, then add in confectioners’ sugar, vanilla, and—the shock addition—a bit heat milk. This makes a cream cheese icing that’s simply the best consistency for adorning this hummingbird Bundt cake. I additionally stir in a sprinkle of cinnamon for an additional kiss of spice, however that’s utterly optionally available.

Spoon the icing over the cake slowly; it’ll start to drip down the edges, and you need to use the spoon to assist information it the place you need it to go.

End with a sprinkle of toasted pecans, and this hummingbird cake is able to fly… proper off the cake stand! (The one pictured is that this one. It’s stunning in individual!) You would additionally adorn the iced cake with coconut, like I do with this coconut Easter cake.

cream cheese icing with cinnamon in glass bowl with red spatula.

pineapple and banana Bundt cake cut with 2 slices on a green and pink floral cake stand.

slice of hummingbird Bundt cake with cream cheese icing on white plate with gold fork.

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