Pineapple Upside-down cake

Made this last night. It's a terribly easy recipe, I've cooked it quite a few times now and its one of my absolute favorite deserts. Sadly, I had a wonderful photo- but it's gone missing. :( The cake I have no has a few slices taken out of it though, so the pictures not as pretty as the full cake!

An interesting snippet of history: According to most historians, the late 1800s were when the term “upside down cake” first began appearing. Up until that time, this type of cake was referred to as skillet cakes. This was because ovens have not always been common or reliable, skillet cakes were born of practicality. Cakes were made in the popular cast-iron skillets on top of the stove. Inverting a cake to reveal a topping was very popular as far back as the Middle Ages.

The first upside-down cakes were not even made with pineapple, but with seasonal fruits such as apples and cherries, as the canned pineapple hadn’t been invented yet. Canned pineapple manufacturing didn’t begin until 1901 when Jim Dole established the Hawaiian Pineapple Company (now Dole Company) and began producing and marketing mass quantities of canned pineapple.

In 1925, the Hawaiian Pineapple Company sponsored a contest calling for pineapple recipes with judgess from the Fannie Farmer’s School, Good Housekeeping, and McCall’s Magazine on the judging panel. It is said that 2,500 of the 60,000 submissions were recipes for pineapple upside-down cake. The company decided to run an ad about the flood of pineapple upside-down cake recipes it had received, and the cake’s popularity increased!

Pineapple upside-down cakes began appearing in magazines, cookbooks, and advertisements. In 1927, a booklet was published called Aunt Sammy's Radio Recipes, Developed by the Bureau of Home Economics, U.S. Department of Agriculture, and written by Ruth Van Deman and Fanny Walker Yeatman. The booklet was a compilation of 70 menus and about 300 recipes broadcast from October 1926 to June 1927 in the "Housekeepers' Chat" programs of the radio service. -- Courtesy of whatscookingamerica.net

I'd also heard it said that the cake was popularized by dole pineapple in order to increase pineapple sales!

Pineapple Upside-Down Cake
Adapted from Gourmet, February 2000

Authors edits: The original recipe for this cake had three teaspoons of cardamom in it, alternately loved and loathed by recipe reviewers. Having no interest in a chai-flavored cake, I took it out and was left with the most flawless and easy go-to upside down cake, something I look forward to making every summer.

My Edits: I also added a handful of chopped nuts to the caramel topping. Other than that, and it turned out PERFECT! (I left out the cardamom as well)

Topping:
1/2 medium pineapple, peeled, quartered lengthwise, and cored
3/4 stick unsalted butter
3/4 cup packed light brown sugar (I actually prefer to use extra dark brown sugar)

Batter:
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
3/4 stick unsalted butter, softened
1 cup granulated sugar
2 large eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 tablespoon dark rum
1/2 cup unsweetened pineapple juice
2 tablespoons dark rum for sprinkling over cake

*note: I've used regular Bacardi rum both in the cake, and sprinkled over the top, and its still tasty delicious. (I won't buy anymore rum until I go through the 2 liter I picked up a year ago!)

Special equipment: a well-seasoned 10-inch cast-iron skillet. If you lack a cast-iron skillet of this size, make the caramel in a small pot and scrape it into the bottom of a similarly-sized cake pan.

Preheat oven to 350°F.

Make topping: Cut pineapple crosswise into 3/8-inch-thick pieces. Melt butter in skillet. Add brown sugar and simmer over moderate heat, stirring, 4 minutes. Remove from heat. Arrange pineapple on top of sugar mixture in concentric circles, overlapping pieces slightly.

Make batter: Sift together flour, baking powder, and salt. Beat butter in a large bowl with an electric mixer until light and fluffy, then gradually beat in granulated sugar. Add eggs, 1 at a time, beating well after each addition. Beat in vanilla and rum. Add half of flour mixture and beat on low speed just until blended. Beat in pineapple juice, then add remaining flour mixture, beating just until blended. (Batter may appear slightly curdled.)

Spoon batter over pineapple topping and spread evenly. Bake cake in middle of oven until golden and a tester comes out clean, about 45 minutes. Let cake stand in skillet 5 minutes. Invert a plate over skillet and invert cake onto plate (keeping plate and skillet firmly pressed together). Replace any pineapple stuck to bottom of skillet. Sprinkle rum over cake and cool on plate on a rack.

Serve cake just warm or at room temperature.

Cake may be made 1 day ahead and chilled, covered. Bring to room temperature before serving.