Retro Pineapple Upside-Down Cake

There's an interesting story behind this recipe. I had it once eating at a friend's residence dining hall at university, and somehow I got so hung up on it that I needed to get the recipe. However, I had no idea who to ask- so I asked one of the kitchen staff, who told me to contact the catering office, which eventually took me through a chain of e-mails to a creepy but cool basement kitchen where a very nice lady gave me a photocopy of the recipe for my beloved pineapple upside-down cake. Turns out it's an old one that used to be printed on the bags from Robin Hood flour, but their recipe has since changed and cannot be found online. It's lucky, then, that I found the source of the old version I liked so much.

Since the recipe given to me was in near-industrial proportions (think 10 cups of butter), I cut it down to a more manageable home-baking size. I also had to figure out the procedure for making it on my own, since no instructions were given. I found that crumbling the butter with the dry ingredients first made for a better texture, and that you had to bake it at a relatively high temperature for a long time for it to cook all the way through.

I made a couple of changes of my own- the rum extract, replacing some of the milk with sour cream for tenderness, and cake flour instead of all-purpose. This cake is even better if you use fresh pineapple, though the canned one is definitely more retro-Americana. Don't skip the cherries if you want the full '50s flair, not that the era had much going for it apart from cake if you ask me. Because it's so pretty, you might want to serve this as the centerpiece dessert for an all-American meal or with coffee when guests with a particularly sweet tooth (there's a lot of butterscotchy caramel in the topping) are over.

Pineapple Upside-Down Cake

1 3/4 C. Cake flour
1 C. Sugar
1/2 TBSP Baking powder
1/2 Tsp. Salt
1/2 C. (115 g.) Butter, softened
2 Eggs
1/2 C. Sour cream
1/4-1/3 C. Milk
1 Tsp. Vanilla extract
1 Tsp. Rum extract, optional

Topping:
1 3/4 C. Dark brown sugar
1/2 C. (115 g.) Butter, melted
1 Can pineapple rings, or 1 ripe pineapple cut into thin slices
9 Maraschino or glacé cherries, optional

Preheat oven to 190℃.

Mix flour, sugar, baking powder and salt. Work in butter until crumbly.

Mix the eggs, sour cream, milk and vanilla and pour into the dry ingredients. Mix until just combined.

For the topping, blend the brown sugar and melted butter until well-combined. pour into a 9''x9'' square pan or 10" round pan. Arrange pineapple slices and cherries and pour the batter on top, spreading evenly.

Bake for 45-55 minutes. Let cool at least 10 minutes before inverting the pan onto the serving plate.