Its another Hump Day My Sweets! It also happens to be my Father's 76th Birthday so today's baked dish is honor of him. Between us, this excites him, he loves being the center of peoples attention, any and every day and especially today! He truly is a crazy Old Man. To Celebrate his most favorite day of the year, why not make his most favorite cake ever. Pineapple Upside Cake. But of course if I'm making it, you know its got some twist on the classic. i like to call my version The Pineapple Express, no not the like the movie, but I guarantee it will hit the spot if you have munchies!
Into the kitchen I went digging through my cake pan closet and came across one of those flexi cake molds, the kind that is well, flexible. I thought its been a while lets go with a bundt, and instantly I made myself giggle thinking of the scene from My Big Fat Greek Wedding, where the mom is perplexed by the hole in the bundt cake so she puts a flower in it ! HAHA This cake also brought back some other nostalgic memories as I remember it was one of the first cakes my Grandma ever taught me how to make. And she always taught me when making a recipe, make it your own, and create whatever you think will taste best. She always did enjoy my experiments! On her advice whenever I decide I'm going to make a flavorful cake such as this, its best to go ahead and add as much of that flavor as I can. Traditionally Pineapple upside down cake consists of yellow fluffy cake, topped with caramelized pineapples slices or caramelized chopped pineapple. My version however is anything but traditional. Making this cake when pineapples are in season is always yummy and fresh, however since its not really the season yet, I'm going with the canned variety that you can get at any local store. I got both rings, and the chopped cause we are about to get crazy!
When making my batter, I like to use some of the pineapple juice that comes with the canned pineapple. It not only makes it moist but gives the actual cake a nice hint of pineapple flavor. While my big old mixer was combining all the wet and dry ingredients, I got my flexi bundt pan ready. After I greased it up, Flexi or not you have to grease the pan to make the cake come out nice and easy, I placed some of the pineapple slices on the bottom of the pan. The greasing of the pan and keeping the pineapples on the bottom actually help in making the slices turn a nice caramel color. Next I pour the batter over the pineapple and let it even out nicely. Wondering is that all, not on the likely, remember I like to make this as pineapplely as possible. So I grabbed my chopped pineapple and spread it out over the top of the batter. While it is in the oven baking the chopped pineapple will slowly sink into the batter thus making sure that every bite of cake will have some pineapple in it. Make sure if you try this to spread the chopped pineapple evenly over the top, don't worry it won't all sink into the same places, it will actually distribute through out the cake.
After the cake is done and you have flipped it and taken it out of the mold , if using the flexi be very careful because it can stick or fall apart ( I remember one time My mom, well thats a story for another cake), and its cooling, you can admire the nice golden brown color of the pineapple slices and cake itself. What I like to do however, is make a quick and easy coconut glaze to pour over the top. The strong coconut flavor actually intensifies the pineapple making for a tropical explosion in your mouth!
If you thought our little tropical excursion was fun, and were planning on coming over to sing Happy Birthday to get a piece, you can hold those horses! Seems my father has already gotten to the cake, and enjoyed a nice big slice! He also said he doesn't plan on sharing! After last year I should have remembered to make 2, one for my dad and 1 for everyone else! Well My sweets its present time, Till tomorrow ...
Happy Baking from Bradley Sweets!
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