Tahini banana bread with fudge & raisin butter

1. Tip the raisins into a bowl and cover with boiling water. Leave to sit for 1 hour.  Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 190ºC, gas mark 5 and line the long sides and base of a 900g loaf tin with a length of baking parchment.  

2. Put 100g of butter into a large bowl and add the muscovado sugar. Roughly beat the two together with a spoon. Add the eggs and again roughly beat together. Swap the spoon for an electric hand whisk and beat the ingredients until they are fully combined and smooth.

3. Take two of the bananas, peel and roughly chop into a bowl. Use the back of a fork to mash them as thoroughly as possible. Add the mashed banana along with 80g of tahini to the cake batter and beat again until all ingredients are well blended. Fold the flour and baking powder into the mix.

4. Tip the mix into the prepared tin and roughly smooth the surface. Peel the final banana, carefully slice lengthways and arrange on top. Bake for 50-55 minutes. The cake is ready when a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean. Remove the cake and leave to cool.

5. While the cake is cooling, place the remaining butter and tahini into a food processor. Drain the soaked raisins, then squeeze gently to remove as much excess liquid as possible before adding to the food processor bowl along with the fudge. Blitz the ingredients until you reach a smooth, quite loose consistency. The butter can now be used as an icing, or I prefer to spoon it into a small dish, then chill it for an hour in the fridge, before serving on top of thick slices of the banana bread.