Banana Cupcakes With Neufchatel Buttercream

I was online this morning comparing different banana cake recipes. The thing that struck me as odd is people saying they use the same recipe interchangeably for banana bread or banana cake. In my opinion, as meager as it may be, there needs to be a difference people! Banana bread is heavy, dense and moist, while banana cake should be tender, light, fluffy and moist. So, after a lot of ingredient comparing, I found a promising recipe that just needed to be tweaked a bit to get the desired results. They were simple to make, baked up beautifully and exactly what I was hoping for! TENDER! LIGHT! FLUFFY! MOIST!

Preheat oven to 350 degrees

Cream together until light and fluffy:

1 cup butter, softened

1 1/2 cups granulated sugar

3 eggs

1 tsp vanilla extract

Add and mix in:

2 1/2 cups all purpose flour or 2 2/3 cups cake flour

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp baking soda

1 tsp baking powder

Fold in:

3/4 cup buttermilk

1 cup mashed ripe bananas (roughly 3 medium bananas)

Line 2 regular muffin tins with cupcake papers and fill each 3/4 of the way full. Bake for 20 minutes. Makes 24 cupcakes.

Neufchatel Buttercream

Our Momma has been using Neufchatel cheese in place of cream cheese in frosting for a long time now. It has a very similar flavor to cream cheese but not quite as tart, a little creamier and smoother. Plus, it’s a 1/3 less fat, can be found in most grocery stores right alongside the cream cheese and is the same price.

Whip together:

8 oz Neufchatel Cheese

1 stick butter, softened

1 tsp vanilla extract

Add 1 cup at a time, mixing between each addition:

5 cups powdered sugar

Add milk a little at a time, if needed to get to spreading consistency.

Original Banana Cake recipe found at allrecipes.com. Modified by Kar

Neufchatel Buttercream recipe by Momma and Kar

images by Kar