After a series of trial and error, I finally am ready to present to you the best easy pineapple upside-down cake from scratch! Made with a soft, fluffy, and simple vanilla cake recipe that uses only the most basic ingredients and a pretty topping of caramelized pineapple and maraschino cherries, this classic recipe is slated to be a staple in your baking repertoire.
If you follow my Instagram stories, you might be tired of seeing this pineapple upside-down cake already. That’s because it took me so many times to get it right, and every time I thought I nailed it, I shared it on Instagram, and then it turned out that I hadn’t quite turned out like I’d hoped, after all.
Sorry about that.
It was the fluffy vanilla cake layer that was so difficult. The pineapple and cherry top (/bottom?) is the easy part, it’s just a matter of combining melted butter and brown sugar in a pie plate and assembling your fruit, but a well-suited vanilla cake was much trickier to get right.
Can you believe that my biggest problem was that my cake started out being much too moist?
I wanted a vanilla cake that was reliable and would come out right every time, I needed it to be fluffy and soft, but it also needed to be sturdy enough that it could handle a little bit of weight on top once it was inverted, and not so moist that it absorbed all of the juices from the fruit, leaving you with a soggy sponge for a cake. Mostly, I wanted to answer the question:
How do you make a pineapple upside-down cake from scratch?
It doesn’t seem so difficult, but it took me about 8 attempts to get right.
The answer is simple, it takes pineapple, cherries, butter, sugar, flour, milk, eggs, and baking powder. The ratios took a while to perfect, but after some experimentation with eliminating the buttermilk and sour cream that I had been using in my recipe (and getting a bit friendlier with the baking powder than I initially was comfortable with), I finally achieved a stable, versatile, from-scratch vanilla cake layer that paired perfectly with the fruit topping and was not at all sponge-y.
The best part is that this vanilla cake recipe calls for only the most basic ingredients, making for an extremely easy pineapple upside down cake.
The final result was perfection ^^^
In anticipation of a question I get asked frequently about inverting cakes, I wanted to address the best way to flip your pineapple upside-down cake. Trust me, it’s extremely simple, but since the inversion part is so critical to this pineapple upside-down cake, I wanted to address that here, but I’m sorry if this seems too rudimentary to you!
How do I flip a pineapple upside-down cake?
- Allow your pineapple upside-down cake to cool for 10-15 minutes before you attempt inversion. If any of the cake has baked into the edge of your pie plate or cake pan, you can use a knife to gently loosen the edges and free them from the pan.
- Place your cake platter (or any plate that’s larger than your pineapple upside-down cake) over the pan — plate surface should be facing your vanilla cake layer.
- Using oven mitts carefully and firmly grip both the side of the cake platter and the cake pan on either side.
- Carefully but quickly flip everything over so that the bottom of the cake pan is facing upwards, and then set down your cake platter and carefully remove the cake pan (careful, it will still be hot!)
And that is it! This cake tastes best warm, so while you still want it to cool a bit, I don’t recommend waiting too long to dig in!
Enjoy!
How to make Pineapple Upside-Down Cake
Pineapple Upside Down Cake
Ingredients
Topping
- 1/4 cup butter melted (60g)
- 1/2 cup brown sugar tightly packed (100g)
- 10 pineapple rings/slices patted dry
- maraschino cherries
Vanilla Cake
- 1/2 cup butter softened to room temperature (115g)
- 3/4 cup sugar (150g)
- 2 eggs room temperature preferred
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour (195g)
- 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 cup milk room temperature preferred (120ml)
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350F (175C)
- Pour melted butter into 9" pie plate or deep cake pan, make sure it entirely covers the bottom of the pan and use a spoon or spatula to grease the sides of the pan.
- Sprinkle brown sugar evenly over butter mixture. Arrange pineapple slices over the bottom of the pan, slice leftover slices in half and arrange up the sides of the pan, as seen in photo.
- Place cherries in center of pineapple rings and as desired in empty spaces. Set aside.
- To prepare vanilla cake, beat butter and sugar in medium-sized bowl until creamy and well-combined.
- Add eggs, beating one at a time until combined.
- Stir in vanilla extract.
- In a separate bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, and salt.
- Alternate adding flour and milk to the wet ingredients, starting and ending with flour and mixing until just combined after each addition (I prefer to do this part by hand with a spatula to be sure not to overmix).
- Pour batter evenly over prepared cake pan and pineapple/cherry layer.
- Bake on 350F (175C) for 30 minutes. At the 30 minute mark, loosely cover with foil and continue to bake (still on 350F/175C) for another 15 minutes, until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out mostly clean with few crumbs (total cook time for cake will be 45 minutes).
- Allow to cool for 10-15 minutes and then carefully invert cake onto serving platter (careful, it will still be very hot!).
- Allow to cool before cutting and enjoying, but don't wait too long as this cake tastes wonderful (best!) warm from the oven!
Nutrition
PIN IT:
You Might Also Like:
Yoly says
Hello Sam, I was looking for an easy biscuit recipe and I found your site, Love It! I have a sweet tooth like you so I decided to try this recipe. Your recipe for Pineapple Upside-down Cake is super easy and Delicious, OMG! your recipe results in a cake that is light, moist and tasty, just right.
Do you have any recipes with Self Rising flour? I read that if you use 1-2tsp of baking power you can substitute all-purpose flour with self-rising flour however, I find the texture tougher. Any suggestions?
Thank you for all your recipes and now you have another faithful subscriber.
Sam says
Hi Yoly! I am so glad you enjoyed the cake. I don’t typically use self rising flour so I don’t have any recipes, or advice on how to use it. Thanks for following along. 🙂
Johnny Imgrund says
Could you add coconut to the cake? Would that impact recipe?
Sam says
Hi Johnny! I think you’d be fine to add coconut without making any other changes. Enjoy!
Don C says
Delicious dessert! The vanilla cake is super yummy! I feel I would like to have the “topping” on both the top and the bottom, so I may experiment with this next time. Great recipe…thanks!
Sam says
I am so glad you enjoyed the cake, Don! 🙂
Sarah says
Could I double this recipe and bake in a 9×12 baking pan?
Sam says
Hi Sarah! That should work, but the baking time may vary. I am not sure exactly what it would be. 🙂
Katera Whitehead says
Would you recommend salted butter or unsalted butter?
Sam says
Hi Katera, I’d use salted. Enjoy!
Marian says
I made 2 cakes for my moms 86th birthday.
One with pineapple slices and cherries and the other with sliced peaches in a sunburst swirl with the cherries center in a circle.
Both presented beautifully and delicious.
My new best quick cake to make.
Sam says
I am so glad you enjoyed the cakes, Marian! 🙂
Uma says
Is there a way to use the pineapple juice in this recepie?
Sam says
Hi Uma! You can substitute it for some of the milk but the cake may be drier. 🙂
Betsy says
I baked this cake in a 9 1/2” cast-iron skillet. There were no left-overs between 4 people! It was absolutely de-lish! All 4 of us now have a wonderful recipe. Thank you for this recipe.
Sam says
I am so glad everyone enjoyed the cake, Betsy! 🙂
Alana says
This recipe is the best I made this at the school today and my teachers said that its the best in the class and the most delicious… Thank you
Sam says
I am so glad you enjoyed the cake so much, Alana! 🙂
Jonno says
My first time baking a cake ever, and it turned out amazing!!! Took 10mins longer in my oven. I baked it for my gf as she’s pineapple crazy and she absolutely loved it.
Sam says
I am so glad you enjoyed the cake Jonno! 🙂
Teresa says
I’m not sure what I did wrong but it came out rubbery and eggy tasting.
Sam says
Hi Teresa! I’m so sorry this happened. This should be a light and fluffy cake. Is it possible the batter got over-mixed a little bit? That would cause this problem. I hope this helps. 🙂
Martha Martin says
All good except bake time was off. I didn’t use a pie plate I used a 9″ round cake pan, nice color but I had to add an additional 15 minutes to the bake time and my oven is accurate. thanks for the recipe.
Carol ann Allis says
I made this and just took out of the oven, we are excited to try, it smells so good ! Thank you for this recipe !
Sam says
I hope everyone loves it! 🙂