The crumble on a Cuca Banana Cake is not scattered on at the end. It goes on before the cake bakes, so the butter and sugar set into a golden lid over the batter, crisp on top and faintly salty against the fruit. That is what a cuca is: the streusel-topped cake of Southern Brazil, where the topping is structural rather than decorative.
What is under the crumble
A base made with properly ripe bananas, moist enough to hold together without being wet, studded with chocolate chips that melt into soft pockets as it bakes. The crumble sits over the top of that, crisp against the fruit. It comes as a 20cm loaf at $35, which serves eight, or a 25cm bundt, which serves sixteen. Nothing on it needs refrigerating, and there is no frosting to bruise.
Why we call these travel cakes
The cuca belongs to a range of nine tea cakes and loaves we call travel cakes, and the name is literal. They are sturdy, they travel in a box with no delicate finish to protect, they hold at room temperature, and they look the same when they arrive as they did when they left the kitchen. For anyone putting on a private event without kitchen staff, that is the whole point: no fridge to find, no plating, no assembly on site, nothing to rescue. You collect, you carry, you put them on the table.
Building a table for thirty without a kitchen
The arithmetic is simple once you know the servings. Two 25cm bundts feed thirty-two. A bundt plus two loaves also feeds thirty-two, and gives you three flavours instead of two, which is what makes a table look considered rather than bulk-bought. The nine are:
- Cuca Banana, bananas, chocolate chips and streusel
- Brazilian Carrot, golden rather than spiced, with a chocolate brigadeiro drizzle
- Apple Crumble, with walnuts, raisins and a crumble bottom
- Anthill Coconut, a coconut sponge shot through with chocolate sprinkles
- Jaffa Orange Chocolate, chocolate chips and dark ganache
- Marble Chocolate, double chocolate throughout
- Lemon Blueberry, tres leches ganache and meringue batons
- Pineapple Coconut, tres leches and coconut
- Peanut Butter, crunchy peanut butter through the crumb and a peanut butter ganache
Three of them, the Brazilian Carrot, the Apple Crumble and the Pineapple Coconut, can be made with no added dairy, chosen as a preference at checkout. That is the only place on our food menu where it is a selectable option rather than a request. Our kitchen is small and without exclusive production areas for all of our different recipes, so traces may occur, and nothing is guaranteed safe for severe coeliac disease. The Peanut Butter Cake contains peanuts, plainly and deliberately, so leave it off the list if a guest avoids nuts.
On the day, and the day before
Collect the day before if that suits your run sheet; travel cakes keep at room temperature, away from sun and heat, with no change to how they eat. Carry the box from the bottom and keep the car cool. To serve, dip the knife in hot water and dry it between cuts, and slice a bundt into sixteen rather than eyeballing it, or the far side of the table gets the offcuts. A tray of minis from the mini cakes and petit fours range fills the gaps between the cakes if you want height and variety on the table, and the dessert catering boxes page sets out the other formats.
Try one before you commit to six
A single loaf is the cheapest planning tool you will find. Order one, take it home and cut it with the person you are hosting alongside, and you will know in ten minutes whether the cuca or the marble goes on the table. Doing that together beats deciding from a photograph on your own, and it settles the flavour argument before the guest list does. We have written more about dessert catering formats, about the Brazilian carrot cake, and about how ordering works.
Ordering and visiting
Travel cakes need two days' notice, and the checkout date picker only offers dates the kitchen can meet for what is in your cart. Collection is from our patisserie inside The Welder on Welles Street in the central city, and we do not deliver or courier anything, events included. We are open 10am to 6pm Tuesday to Friday and 10am to 3pm Saturday, and the frequently asked questions page covers storage, transport and changes.
