Banana Breakfast Cake is a delicious banana coffee cake with a tasty vanilla glaze. Everyone loves when we have this for breakfast! A soft and tender banana coffee cake with cinnamon oat crumb topping and icing makes for a great breakfast treat.
Banana Breakfast Cake is the best kind of breakfast because there’s just something wonderful about having a piece of cake for breakfast. I’m not sure if it’s how delicious it smells baking or how it warms the house up – probably a combination of the two. The blend of ripe bananas and cinnamon is perfect too- don’t skip the crumb topping!
What is banana cinnamon breakfast cake?
It’s a cinnamon breakfast cake (often referred to as a coffee cake) that is packed with bananas. A perfect sweet and savory breakfast dish that almost feels like a dessert. With a cinnamon crumb topping and a little powdered sugar glaze over the top this dish is perfect for any time of day.
Banana Cinnamon Breakfast Cake Ingredients
-Eggs: We need 2 eggs to help our cake have the perfect texture. Eggs help in binding ingredients together and creating a cake-like texture in baked goods.
-Sugar: We need 1 cup of granulated sugar to make our cake nicely sweetened.
-Butter: We need 1/2 cup of melted butter (one stick) to give our cake a nice richness.
-Buttermilk: 1/2 cup of buttermilk will help to give our cake the acids and liquids it needs, but you can DIY your own with 1/2 cup of milk and 1/2 teaspoon of lemon juice. Just mix the two together and let it sit for about 5 minutes before using.
-Vanilla: 1 teaspoon of vanilla will help to enhance the flavors in this cake.
-Bananas: For our banana cake we need about 2 mashed bananas (roughly 1 cup). The riper the bananas are the easier they are to mash and the more naturally sweet they become.
-Flour: 2 cups of all-purpose flour will be the base of this cake recipe.
-Leavening agents: We need 1 teaspoon each of baking soda and baking powder to help our cake puff up nicely as it bakes.
-Spices: We need 1 teaspoon of cinnamon and 1/2 teaspoons of nutmeg to make our cake taste wonderful.
-Salt: This is a natural flavor enhancer and helps to highlight the flavors in recipes. We need 1/2 teaspoon of salt to do this.
For the Crumb Topping we will need:
-Butter: 1/2 cup (one stick) of butter will give our cake richness and moisture, but adding it to the top really helps to get that golden color as it bakes too.
-Powdered sugar: 1 cup of powdered sugar will make our crumb topping nice and sweet.
-Flour: With 1/2 cup of flour in the crumb topping, it will hold together nicely.
-Quick oats: We want to use 1/2 cup of quick oats because the texture is perfect once baked. Steel oats or hard oats will not absorb moisture as well and will be very chewy in the end.
-Cinnamon: We just need 1 teaspoon of cinnamon to help spice up our topping.
-Walnuts: While a 1/2 cup of chopped walnuts is optional, it would add a nice nutty crunchy to this cake and we all know how well walnuts and bananas go together, yum.
How to make banana cinnamon breakfast cake
Preheat your oven to 350 degrees F and grease a baking dish with cooking spray. You can use a 9×13 or an 8×11 baking dish depending on how thick you want these to be.
Combine the eggs, sugar, melted butter, buttermilk, and vanilla in a large mixing bowl, stirring until combined.
Add in the bananas.
In another bowl, combine the dry ingredients.
Mix 1/3 of the dry ingredients into the wet ones, stirring until just combined.
Repeat until all of the dry ingredients have been mixed into the wet ones, making sure not to over-stir. A few lumps are okay.
Pour your batter into the prepared baking dish.
Prepare the crumb topping by mixing all of the ingredients together in a bowl, except for the butter.
Cut the butter into small pieces and then add them to the mixture using a pastry cutter or two forks.
Blend them together until crumbly.
Pour the crumb topping over the batter in the pan.
Bake in the oven for 35-40 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.
Let the cake cool.
Drizzle the cake with a simple powdered sugar glaze if desired.
Slice, serve & enjoy! 
BANANA CINNAMON BREAKFAST CAKE
Ingredients
- 2 eggs
- 1 cup granulated sugar
- 1/2 cup melted butter
- 1/2 cup buttermilk or 1/2 cup milk + 1/2 tsp lemon juice
- 1 tsp vanilla
- 2 ripe bananas mashed
- 2 cups flour
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 1 tsp cinnamon
- 1/2 tsp nutmeg
- 1/2 tsp salt
Crumb Topping
- 1/2 cup butter
- 1 cup powdered sugar
- 1/2 cup flour
- 1/2 cup quick oats
- 1 tsp cinnamon
- 1/2 cup chopped walnuts optional
Glaze (optional)
- 3/4 cup powdered sugar
- 1 Tbsp melted butter
- 2 tsp milk
- 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Spray a 9x13 or 8x11 glass pan with nonstick spray.
- In a large bowl, combine the eggs, sugar, melted butter, buttermilk and vanilla. Stir until combined. Add in bananas.
- Combine dry ingredients in a separate bowl. Mix 1/3 of the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients, stirring just until combined. Repeat until ingredients are completely mixed. (Note: quick breads/ cakes like this do better if mixed by hand! Don't over mix and it's okay if there are a few lumps!)
- Pour batter in the prepared pan.
- To prepare the crumb topping, combine all ingredients except butter. Cut butter into small pieces and add to the mixture. Using a pastry cutter (or 2 forks) blend the ingredients until crumbly. Pour over top of batter in the pan.
- Bake for 35-40 minutes. Let cool and drizzle with glaze.
Glaze
- Whisk together the glaze ingredients until smooth and drizzle over cake as desired.
Nutrition
Can I substitute anything for the melted butter in the cake?
Yes, you can use any baking oils instead. I personally love to use coconut oil whenever I can but you could use canola oil or vegetable oil too and have the cake turn out great.
Can I freeze this banana breakfast cake?
Yes and it freezes wonderfully. I recommend not adding the glaze until after the cake has thawed to prevent it from sweating as the cake thaws. Simply make sure to wrap the cake well and place it in an airtight container until ready to eat (up to 3 months). Then thaw, drizzle with glaze (if desired), and serve. You can also reheat it a bit to get that fresh from oven taste if you want to.
Find other sweet bread and breakfast recipes here:
- Homemade Cinnamon Roll recipe
- Easy Mini 15-Minute Cinnamon Rolls
- Cinnamon Roll Cake recipe
- Cinnamon Roll French Toast Casserole
- Cinnamon Roll Snickerdoodles
- Glazed Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls
- Sweet Cinnamon Raisin Bread
- Cinnamon Biscuits with Honey Butter
- Pumpkin Cinnamon Roll recipe
- Easy Cinnamon Roll Quick Bread
- No Yeast Cinnamon Rolls Recipe
Banana cinnamon breakfast cake is a banana coffee cake recipe you’re going to want to keep on hand. Finding a ripe bananas recipe like this one is always like striking gold and you’re going to love biting into this delectable cake in the morning.
Susan says
Wow! I would love to wake up to this baking in the oven. I can hardly wait to try it. Thanks for sharing.
Alice Temple says
Hello, could this recipe be made in a bundt pan?
Alison says
I’m sure it would work just fine! You may want to keep an eye on it and adjust the time accordingly.
Lisa says
This was delicious! I made it with some bananas that I had frozen & it turned out beautifully. I loved the oatmeal in the topping! I’d love to see this with blueberries or even frozen cherries….apple or mango? So many possibilities!
Jessica says
What can I substitute the melted butter ?
Jessica says
You can use any type of oil- coconut, a light olive oil or canola/ vegetable oil. : )
Valerie C. says
Absolutely AMAZING recipe! I tripled it because I had six over ripe bananas. Worked out great! Question, do you prefer this cold or at room temperature?
Nellie says
I usually eat it at room temperature, I’ve never tried it cold!
Amy says
So excited to try this. I am new to baking though…after I put the glaze/icing on, could i freeze the cake for eating in one week or will that not work?
Nellie says
I would freeze the cake before adding the glaze and then just add that right before serving once the cake has thawed out. It may work to freeze with the glaze, but my guess is that it may crack quite a bit when frozen and the consistency might not be quite right.
Regina says
This was very very good. Turned out and we enjoyed it.
I did not put the glaze on it as we liked the flavor as is and didnt want the added sweetness.
Judy Lanza says
Can you make this recipe in muffins?
Jessica says
They’d be a bit more crumbly muffins, just fyi.