Apple Cornmeal Upside Down Cake

When talk about an upside down cake, the first thing that comes into my mind is a pineapple upside down cake, probably the most popular and heard of, of an upside down cake. It is believed that an upside down cake has came about during the 19th century but the term 'upside down' wasnt much used, it was called a 'skillet cake' due to the fact that oven was not commonly used in those days and the cakes were actually cooked in skillets, on top of the stove. The fruits were first cooked on the skillet, followed by the batter and once it's done, flip the skillet over a plate to show the pretty fruits. And also apples and maraschino cherries upside down cake actually came first before the pineapples. The pineapple cake was made popular only after the invention of canned pineapples.

This apple upside down cake today has been chosen for our bake along this week. Actually me, Joyce and Zoe just realised that the recipe that we are using from the Bon Appetit cookbook is a little different from the one that we found at the bonappetit.com earlier in regards to the flour amount, eggs, milk and slightly different steps of mixing but i hope that it turns out just as good as the one that the three of us are making from the book.  It is a nice cake to eat with very soft and tender crumbs along with the baked caramelised apples. If you have not tried making any upside down cakes, try it someday and have a little fun flipping your pan over for some delicious treat.

Recipe ( from bon appetit Desserts book )
3/4 recipe in a 7 inch round pan
85gm butter, room temp divided 22gm and 63gm
84gm sugar for caramelising apple plus 80gm sugar for batter

3 green apples, peeled, cut into eighths, cored
94gm cake flour/ all purpose flour
23gm yellow cornmeal
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/8tsp salt
1 medium size egg, mine about 52gm
3/8cup buttermilk

Method:
Position rack in center of oven and preheat to 175C. Grease or spray your baking tin with 2 inch high sides with  nonstick spray. Melt 22gms butter in a pan over medium high heat. Add 84gm sugar and stir until sugar melts and turns golden brown, about 3 minutes. Add apples and saute over medium heat until apples are just tender and coated with caramel, about 12 minutes. Immediately pour mixture into prepared pan, distribute apples and caramel evenly over bottom of pan.

Whisk flour, cornmeal, baking soda and salt in a medium bowl. Using electric mixer, beat remaining butter 63gm and sugar 80gm sugar in a large bowl until fluffy. Beat in egg. Add half of flour mixture, stir in buttermilk. Add remaining flour and mix well. Drop batter by spoonfuls evenly over apples amd spread gently with a spatula.

Bake until cake is golden brown and tester inserted into center comes out clean, about 40 minutes. Cool cake in pan for 5 minutes, using a round bladed knife go around the cake sides to loosen the cake, place a plate over the pan. Using oven mitts as aid, firmly grasp pan and plate together and turn over. Gently lift pan off cake.

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