Foodie, Formerly Fat

The other night Evelyn and I were reading Charlotte’s Web. Would you believe that a description of the slop thrown into Wilbur the pig’s trough was the inspiration for this cake? Well, believe it!

Seriously, the description was a list of items that Farmer Zuckerman was bringing in the pail to throw in Wilbur’s trough. It included all the remnants from the people’s dinner including biscuits, gravy, potato skins, and upside down cake. Evelyn let out a huge sigh and said, “I’ll never get to have upside down cake.” I disguised my amusement because she seemed so earnest and asked her why she thought she’d never get to have it. Her reason was that I had never made one.

At that I did chuckled and told her I’d make one within a week. So, after she’d gone to sleep I started researching upside down cakes. Of course, the standard pineapple came up first. Then I started seeing recipes for things like cherry upside down cake, apple upside down cake (tarte tatin, duh) and banana upside down cake. I realized that while pineapple is famous it’s really just a method more than a recipe.

With this in mind I gave Evelyn her choice of fruit and she chose bananas. This cake was easy to throw together, one bowl, one pie plate, one saucepan. And man it was good too!