The #1 spot on my Rhubarb to-do list for 2012 is this Rhubarb Upside-Down Cake, and I had planned for it to debut on my dining room table for Mother’s Day dessert. I had been hyping up this cake to my parents for like three weeks, so you can imagine my rage disappointment when I found myself at the farmer’s market near my house on Sunday morning at 10:30am being informed that they had sold out of rhubarb already.

My brain went into recovery mode and zoomed straight to the three packages of strawberries already in my fridge. I thought about strawberry shortcake, but a quick search on Joy’s site lead me straight to this Strawberry Upside-Down Cake! Rejoice! It was so good, we weren’t even mad at it for not being rhubarb! We ate it warm, right out of the oven with some vanilla fro/yo, and it was incredible. Like warm strawberry jam oozing into a super soft warm cake. Heavenly!

For dinner, I made a Chicken Pot Pie concoction that was Take a Megabite’s recipe for the filling, and then instead of a pastry crust, I did this scalloped potato situation on the top. It was a nice change and very good. On the side we had a green salad with roasted cherry tomatoes, candied pecans and grated carrots, because Nicole had me over for dinner last week and made that for me and it was such a great combo. I also made some buttermilk biscuits to go along with it.

I felt a little bit like I was on IRON CHEF: Mother’s Day Edition, because I was at the park with my niece and nephews all afternoon and didn’t really have anything prepped in advance. No matter, Mom sat on the balcony with a glass of wine and read my magazines while Dad watched some golf as I worked myself into a frenzy in the kitchen. It all turned out great and I had an epic little spread of leftovers at my desk the next day for lunch!

 

Strawberry Upside-Down Cake

Source: Joy the Baker

Yield: 8 big slices

Ingredients

Topping

2 tbsp butter

1/4 cup brown sugar

1 cup sliced strawberries (I would maybe bump this up to 1 1/2 cups next time…more strawberry goodness can’t be a bad thing)

Cake

1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, room temperature

2/3 cups brown sugar

1 egg

1 tsp vanilla

1 1/3 cups flour

1 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp baking soda

1/4 tsp salt

2/3 cup sour cream

Directions

  1. Preheat the oven to 350. Add the butter to a 8″ or 9″ cake pan, and stick it in the oven. When it’s melted, take out the pan and swirl it around so the butter coats the bottom/sides of the pan. Sprinkle the brown sugar evenly over the bottom of the cake pan, then place the strawberries on top. You can try to do a fancy design if you like! 
  2. For the cake, in a big bowl, mix together the butter and brown sugar with an electric mixer until light and fluffy. Add the egg and vanilla and mix again.
  3. Add the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Stir a few times with a spatula, then add the sour cream and stir again. Use the mixer to blend just until all the ingredients are blended together.
  4. Pour cake batter overtop of the strawberries and use an offset spatula to spread it out. Bake for 30 minutes until a toothpick inserted into the cake comes out clean. Let cake cool for 10 minutes, then turn it out onto a pretty platter. Delicious served warm!