PINEAPPLE UPSIDE-DOWN CAKE

I had put this recipe on hold for the longest time. Maybe because it is too easy. The actual fun is in the waiting. If you are making it for the first time, you may find a restlessness in you, walking by the oven 3-4 times in the 30 mins., and all this only to see what it looks like after you have turned the cake over onto your cake dish. When my cake was ready and turned over, I was happy as a clam.

Now, I would like to warn you about one thing. Unless you are using the actual candied cherries, don't get carried away in the excitement like me and 'decorate' all the empty spaces on the bottom of the pan with the so called 'cherries' from your little fruit shop by the road. They are not cherries! And they kind of spoil the taste of the cake. So, while eating the cake, you end up picking the 'cherries' and putting them away.

Ingredients:

• Butter (softened) - 150g + a little more for greasing,

• Sugar - 3/4th cup + 2 Tbsp,

• Flour - 1 cup,

• Eggs - 3,

• Baking powder - 1 1/2 tsp,

• Baking soda - 1/3rd of a tsp,

• Pineapple essence - 1 tsp (optional),

• Tinned Pineapple slices (preferably in juice),

•  a little yellow food colour (optional),

• 5 Tbsp of the juice that the pineapples were in,

• Glazed cherries/ Candied cherries/ Maraschino cherries.

Method:

• Preheat  the oven to 200°C. Grease a round cake tin (mine is 10 and a half inch in diameter, about 26 cms.) with little butter, and sprinkle around 2 Tbsp of superfine /caster sugar. If you don't have superfine sugar, just measure out your regular granular sugar, and powder it.

• Drain the pineapple slices, reserve 5 Tbsp of the tinned juice. If you have pineapple slices in syrup, reserve the syrup. Line the bottom of the cake tin with the pineapple slices, and place a cherry inside the rings. 

• Cream the butter and sugar in a bowl. Use an electric whisk, it's easier. Add the eggs, and pineapple essence (if using) and whisk.

• Add the flour, baking powder, and baking soda, and whisk to make a smooth batter.

• Pour in the cake tin over the pineapples, and smooth out the top. Bake at 200°C for 30 mins.

• Let it cool for 15 mins., release the edges with a palette knife (or something like that), and flip over onto your cake dish.

• Give yourself an applaud!

Let us know how your cake turned out to be. Happy Baking!