Dolly Parton’s Southern Style Perfectly Moist Banana Flavoured Cake Mix – Part Deux!

 

In February our much-missed ex-pat friend Louise (aka “Weezie”) blew into London from her adopted home of Galloway, Ohio for a whirlwind visit. As you may recall, for Christmas 2022 Weezie posted me two packs of Dolly Parton’s illicit Southern Style Perfectly Moist Banana Flavoured Cake Mix (accompanied by two tubs of her buttercream frosting). I say “illicit” because Duncan Hines has licensed the whole Dolly Parton baking range for US consumption only – none of it is available in UK grocery stores and non-Americans are blocked from buying it online! I whipped up one of the two banana cake mixes in January, and it was a fluffy light-as-air triumph – exactly the kind of cake a 1970s hostess would produce with a flourish after a dinner party! 

So the day before Weezie arrived to spend the weekend with us, I baked the second cake mix. And this time it was bumpier! I made the cake mix the same as before, using the same cake tins, etc. In the oven, they rose a bit as they baked - and one pan began pumping batter down the sides of the parchment paper onto the baking tray below (which of course began burning). I didn’t “overload” it – both pans were evenly distributed. I'd say about 30% of the cake mix pooled down there and there was nothing I could do to stop it. A total mess! I wondered how much "cake" would be left? Damn, I thought - Dolly Parton has REALLY let me down this time! 

/ Seriously ... what the hell?! / 

But … despite that, after they cooled, and I turned the layers out of the pans … they came out pretty damn perfect. In fact, one layer being slightly smaller made the resulting finished cake more symmetrical when I assembled and frosted it, and the results were prettier than in January. Apologies, Dolly – I’ll never doubt you again!

Postscript: Weezie herself doesn’t possess a “sweet tooth” and doesn’t actually like cake! So, she just sampled a sliver! And she brought with her a treasure trove: two more packs of the banana cake mix AND two of the coconut version! (Plus, more buttercream icing). I’ll let you know when I make the still-untried coconut mix.

/ Weezie and I at The Glory in Haggerston on 26 February 2023 /

Reflections on ... Dolly Parton's Southern Style Banana Cake Mix

 

In 2022 the sugary high cholesterol collab of our dreams dropped when the Duncan Hines corporation and beloved Country & Western diva and bouffant wig enthusiast Dolly Parton joined forces for a limited-edition “Southern Style” range of cake mixes and frostings. And the kitschy retro pastel Barbie-like packaging was pure pop art! 

So, imagine how crushed I was when I couldn’t find any of these cake mixes at my local grocery stores in London. And I quickly discovered they were also seemingly impossible to order online outside of America. I sent a message to Duncan Hines via their Twitter account querying this, and a representative explained the licensing agreement exclusively covers the US, meaning no one outside of the country can buy Parton’s cake mixes. It was seemingly never meant to be … 

... until my sassy Ohio-residing British ex-pat friend Louise (“Weezie) came to the rescue! She sent me two packages of Parton’s banana-flavoured cake mixes and two tubs of her buttercream frosting as a Christmas gift. (I don’t even want to think how much the postage must have cost her). I was going to hang onto them for special occasions (plus I’m trying to shift some post-Christmas – hell, post-Covid lockdown – blubber). And then there were the legal concerns. Am I breaking the law? It felt illicit! This cake mix is not licensed for use in the UK! But I cracked and - donning my frilly pinafore - whipped-up one of the mixes yesterday. 

My verdict? Even though the box screamed “DO NOT EAT RAW BATTER” in bold and upper case, I sampled some of the batter and it gave instant promising hits of banana milkshake. My layers came out a bit asymmetrical and wonky, but the finished cake is sublime. It’s ultra-sweet and packed with that synthetic banana flavour which is Proustian for those of us who came of age in the seventies before people worried about E-numbers in food. Goddess Dolly never steers you wrong! In conclusion, to paraphrase Homer Simpson: “Mmmm – fattening!” Now I’m determined to get my hands on the coconut-flavoured version!