Hummingbird Cake is a delicious classic Southern cake recipe. Made with bananas, pineapple, and pecans and topped with a cream cheese frosting!
Are you looking for more delicious cake recipes? I think you’ll love my Cream Cheese Pound Cake, Best Chocolate Cake, Coconut Cake, and Best White Cake.
Hummingbird Cake is a favorite cake recipe of my family. My grandmother would make it for special occasions, especially around Christmas, Valentine’s Day, Easter, Mother’s Day, or spring birthdays. It was always front and center at any family gatherings or church socials. Topped with delicious Cream Cheese Frosting and full of banana, pineapple, and roasted pecans, Hummingbird Cake is a Southern classic cake recipe.
Table of Contents
Hummingbird Cake Recipe
How to Make Hummingbird Cake
Ingredients for Hummingbird Cake
To make this favorite cake, you’ll need these ingredients:
- All-purpose flour – Use a light all-purpose flour. You can also substitute it with cake flour.
- Granulated sugar – I use granulated white or raw cane sugar. Use your favorite sugar replacement for baking.
- Baking soda and Baking powder – both are used in this cake recipe.
- Salt – I use Diamond Crystal Kosher Salt. If you substitute with Morton’s Kosher salt, fine sea salt, or table salt, you will only need half the amount of the salt called for in the recipe.
- Ground cinnamon – adds a warm cozy flavor to the cake.
- Eggs – Use room temperature eggs as they incorporate the best into the cake batter.
- Vegetable oil – makes for a moist, tender cake. You can substitute with melted coconut oil, avocado oil, or even melted and cooled butter.
- Vanilla extract – Use your favorite store-bought pure vanilla extract or homemade.
- Bananas – Fresh bananas are mashed and incorporated into the cake batter. They add richness and moisture to the cake.
- Crushed pineapple – The pineapple adds so much fresh flavor to the cake.
- Roasted pecans – the toasted pecans add texture and flavor to the cake. However, I generally omit if serving where there could be a nut allergy or sensitivity.
Step-by-Step Instructions
- Prep. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Prepare three 9-inch cake pans by spraying with baking spray or buttering and lightly flouring.
- Whisk Dry Ingredients. Whisk the flour, sugar, baking soda, baking powder, salt, and ground cinnamon in a large bowl and set aside.
- Mix Wet Ingredients. Cream the eggs, vegetable oil, vanilla extract, pineapple, mashed bananas, and finely chopped roasted pecans in another large bowl.
- Stir. Stir the egg mixture into the flour mixture until just combined.
- Bake. Then, divide the batter evenly between the three prepared cake pans and bake for about 20 to 25 minutes, or until a toothpick or skewer inserted in the center of the cake comes out clean. You can follow my tips for how to tell when your cake is done.
- Cool the cake layers. Remove from oven once done and cool in the cake pans for about 10 minutes. Then, turn the cakes onto a wire rack to allow the cakes to cool completely.
- Frost and serve. Once the cakes are completely cool, frost them with Cream Cheese Frosting. I usually make my frosting while my cake is in the oven. Then serve and enjoy!
Origins of Hummingbird Cake
As far as the original maker of the hummingbird cake, it was submitted to Southern Living magazine for the February 1978 issue by Mrs. L.H. Wiggins of Greensboro, North Carolina. Even though she provided her lovely recipe, she did not include the story behind it or its name. Some would say that is a loss, but I think Mrs. Wiggins did us a great favor by allowing our imaginations to conjure up stories as sweet as her delicious cake.
Be sure to add this cake recipe to your must-make list for your next get together. It is sure to delight as well as quickly disappear. Remember to cut the slices thinly as it is rich and as sweet as southern sweet tea.
Role of Oil in Cakes
Cakes using oil in the recipe tend to bake higher, stay moist and tender longer, and result in a cake with an even, open crumb and a coarser texture than those using butter.
How Long Does Hummingbird Cake Last?
I prefer to store this cake in the refrigerator since it contains fruit and is topped with cream cheese frosting. In the fridge, it will last up to a week.
Here’s the Hummingbird Cake recipe my family has used for years. It differs slightly from Mrs. Wiggins’ original, but I love the changes.
Hummingbird Cake Recipe
Ingredients
- 3 cups (360 g) all-purpose flour
- 2 cups (396 g) granulated sugar
- 1 teaspoon (6 g) baking soda
- 1 teaspoon (4 g) baking powder
- 1 teaspoon (2.8 g) kosher salt
- 1 1/2 teaspoons (3.9 g) ground cinnamon
- 3 large (150 g) eggs
- 1 cup (198 g) vegetable oil
- 2 teaspoons (9.4 g) vanilla extract
- 1 (8-ounce) can (249 g) crushed pineapple,, undrained
- 3 (454 g) bananas, ripe, mashed (about 2 cups)
- 1 cup (114 g) roasted pecans, finely chopped
- Cream Cheese Frosting
Instructions
- Prep. Preheat oven to 350º F. Prepare three 9-inch cake pans by spraying with baking spray or buttering and lightly flouring.
- Whisk Dry Ingredients. Whisk together the flour, sugar, baking soda, baking powder, salt, and ground cinnamon in a large bowl. Set aside.
- Cream Wet Ingredients. Cream together the eggs, oil, vanilla extract, pineapple, mashed bananas, and finely chopped pecans in another large bowl. Stir the egg mixture into the flour mixture until just combined.
- Bake and cool. Evenly divide the batter between the three prepared pans and bake for about 20 to 25 minutes, or until a toothpick or skewer inserted in the center of the cake comes out clean. Remove from the oven and allow to cool for about 10 minutes. Turn cakes onto a wire rack and allow to cool completely.
- Frost. Frost with cream cheese frosting.
- Store. Store in the refrigerator covered with plastic wrap or a cake dome for up to a week.
Notes
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
Enjoy!
Robyn xo
From the Add a Pinch recipe archives. Originally published in 2011.
I just made this cake for Easter dessert. I used like a 9 x 13 rectangle glass pan. I didn’t have 3 round ones. Had to bake a bit longer, but, it came out great. It was a hit with my family and friends. I will make it again. Thanks.
I had three round pans. Two of them cooked in the time allotted but one took a bit longer. Just keep an eye on it/them and use your judgement.
I don’t have a bundt pan. Can I make this cake in a 9×13 glass dish? If so would I need to change any part of the recipe or would I need to bake it differently? Thanks
Love the Hummingbird Cake. It is one of my absolute favourites. As to it’s recipe origins, I am afraid Mrs Wiggins of North Carolina is a bit cheeky in claiming to be the creator of the recipe. The cake was first known to have come from Jamaica. The recipe was sent out across America in a promotional kit for Jamaica.
Below is an exert of on reference about the cake’s history, and link to the blog on Jamie Oliver’s web page. By the way, your recipe and cake look more appealing than Mr Oliver’s version. Personally, i am grateful to Mrs Wiggins and Americans for sharing this delicious recipe, as it made its way to Australia and in to my heart.
“Despite its cryptic name, the Hummingbird cake’s origins are clearer than most. Usually the origins of foods are shrouded in the mists of time, handed down from generation to generation before popping up somewhere completely different.
The giveaway to the Hummingbird cake’s birthplace, however, is in the key ingredients – bananas and pineapple. Hopefully you’re already thinking of the Caribbean, and it’s thought to have been invented in Jamaica, probably in the late ‘60s.
Originally, it was called the “Doctor bird cake”, a nickname for a Jamaican variety of hummingbird called the Red-billed Streamertail. The name came from the way the bird’s long beak probes flowers, like a doctor inspecting a patient. So what does that have to do with a pineapple and banana cake? Some say the cake was named after the bird because it was sweet enough to attract hummingbirds (who eat only nectar), while others say the yellow streaks of banana was reminiscent of the bird’s plumage. Either way, the Doctor bird was about to take flight.
In 1968, the Jamaican tourist board decided to try attracting tourists by sending out press kits to the US. In the packs were a few recipes from the island, including one for the Doctor bird cake. Over the next few years, similar recipes started to crop up in local papers and community cookbooks across the South under various different names, including the prophetic “Cake that doesn’t last”.
Most food historians agree the first printed recipe for Hummingbird cake was by one Mrs L H Wiggin. She supplied the recipe to Southern Living magazine in February 1978, but even before then there are countless references to the cake in county fair reports and baking competitions across southern America.”
Read more at http://www.jamieoliver.com/news-and-features/features/history-hummingbird-cake/#YFtZorheIdG2z8B3.99″
Have been baking this cake in a tube pan (350/60-70min) since around 1964 while I lived in Philadelphia. We serve it without frosting. Batter is mixed by hand, making a well in the center of sifted dry ingredients and adding whole eggs, oil, pineapple and sliced ripe bananas and vanilla and stirring with a wooden spoon until dry ingredients are moistened. Easiest cake recipe that I bake eliminating the need of an electric mixer as well as mashing the bananas! Perhaps cream cheese frosting differentiates the Northern v. Southern take on this cake that is moist and delicious with or without frosting.
I made your delicious cake, but I have made it lower in sugar. I only put 1/2 cup of sugar, instead of 2 cups. Instead of 1 cup vegetable oil, I used 1/2 cup of coconut oil. Instead of an 8oz can of pineapples, I used fresh pineapple, I magic bulleted 1/2 a pineapple (about 2 cups as liquid) and chopped 1/3 cup of pineapple for texture. As for my roasted pecans, I put about 1tsp cinnamon and 1tbs maple syrup on them prior to roasting them. Finally, I added 1/4cup flax seed to my flour mixture. Ummmm delicious and a little healthier:) thank you and I hope you’ll like my less traditional version:)
I’m diabetic but under control. I would like to try this version just seems a little complicated. What does the flax seed do?
This recipe can be prepared in a cupcakes liners too??
I’m too busy to make a cake from scratch. Can I just use a box cake and add the pineapple, banana and nuts?
Oh come on. This is easy.
Hi, do u have a cupcake recipe for this? wanna take it into work, and that would be alot easier..
You probably already made this, but in case any one else is wondering- I just halved the recipe to make a dozen large cupcakes. Fill 3/4 of the way. I also made a stabilized pineapple whipped cream frosting (drain crushed pineapples really well) and sprinkled toasted coconut flakes on it, and garnished with a wedge of pineapple. I thought it turned out excellent, and my family enjoyed them.
I have never eaten this cake before, but it looks soooo good! I plan to make it in the near future, maybe for my birthday even.
My 9 yr old daughter whom I homeschool has been doing a State Bird project for Science each week since the beginning of school back in October and sadly, the Hummingbird isn’t a state bird. So I think to reward her for her efforts, I will make this cake when she finishes all of the state birds in her Science book!