Nectarine Upside-Down Cake
A vibrant cake with fresh nectarines drenched in sweet, buttery goodness!
I’m a HUGE, no wait, actually, I’m the BIGGEST, cake person ever. If I could, I’d eat cake for breakfast, lunch, dinner and as a midnight snack. But, because I don’t look like anything close to Heidi Klum and my metabolism moves at a snail pace, I could only eat cake once in a blue moon. And even when I do, I have to do portion control.
But I’ll let you in on a little secret. Portion control = sucks.
Okay so that’s not much of a secret but I just wanted to point that out.
That being said, I made this AH-MAZING nectarine upside-down cake and I didn’t do a very good job of portion control. And then I gained like 5 pounds.
But you know what? It was completely worth it. Every single bite was to die for, especially those corner pieces where the peaches got really caramelized and their amazing juice just dripped down the sides.
Crap, now I need to make this again and eat the whole dang cake by myself. Spin class, here I come!
So here’s how you make this:
Let’s first start with the dry ingredients.
Then we’ll whisk together the wet ones – buttermilk, 4 tablespoons butter and eggs.
Next we’ll stir the wet to dry.
Now let’s swirl around the remaining 4 tablespoons butter in the bottom of a cake pan, or cast iron skillet if you wish. You want to make sure you get the sides too. We don’t want the cake sticking to the pan because, well, that would be a nightmare.
Next we’ll sprinkle on some brown sugar goodness.
Then comes the sliced nectarines. Gorgeous, right? I could seriously eat this as is.
Last but not least, we’ll top it off with the batter.
Be sure to smooth out the tops.
Then it goes in the oven for about 45 minutes. Mine came out a bit disfigured and I totally thought this was an epic fail but once you flip it…
TA-DA! You have this major beautifulness. Easy peasy, right? As long as you butter up your pan, your cake should come out without any trouble.
Then grab a plate, cut a slice, and eat. When you’re done with your first slice, go get some seconds. And thirds. And fourths. No one’s judging. I promise. Well, at least not me. I had at least 3 slices!
Nectarine Upside-Down Cake
Ingredients
- 2 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 cup sugar
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 1 cup buttermilk
- ½ cup 1 stick unsalted butter, melted and divided
- 2 large eggs
- ½ cup brown sugar, packed
- 4 nectarines, sliced into 1 1/2-inch thick wedges
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
- In a large bowl, combine flour, sugar, baking soda and salt.
- In a large glass measuring cup or another bowl, whisk together buttermilk, 4 tablespoons butter and eggs. Pour mixture over dry ingredients and stir using a rubber spatula just until moist.
- Add remaining 4 tablespoons butter to the bottom of a cast iron skillet or 9-inch cake pan, swirling the pan until the bottom and sides are well coated. Sprinkle brown sugar evenly over the melted butter. Arrange nectarine slices on top in a single layer. Scoop the batter evenly over the nectarines, smoothing out the top.
- Place into oven and bake for 45 minutes, or until a tester inserted in the center comes out clean.
- Let cool for 5-10 minutes. Run a knife around the edge of the cake and turn upside down onto a serving plate.
- Serve immediately.
Did you make this recipe?
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This cake was delicious but the center was undercooked. I baked it for 55 minutes. I didn’t want to leave it in the oven any longer because the top was a beautiful chestnut brown but i didn’t want to leave it in to see it turn charcoal black. Not sure what happened. Maybe it’s my oven but I don’t think so. The batter was thick as you describe.
I have a question about how thick to cut the nectarine slices. You say 1.5 inches but that is really thick. I also might try peeling the nectarines. The skin is fine but I think cutting the cake will be easier.
I will try this again because it is delicious. I’ll have to figure what I did wrong.
Absolutely delicious!
Can I freeze half?
I made this in a 9×9 pan and used 6 nectarines instead of 4. It only took 30 min to bake. I was nervous when it got done so quick. Let it cook and it came right out of pan. Couldn’t resist trying while still warm and wow!!! It’s awesome!!! Perfectly sweet with a sturdy cake to support the fruit topping. Can’t wait to share it with friends.
Flavor is good but it turned out rubbery.
I’m going to make it tomorrow xx
Well, this was an adventure. A neighbor gifted me five nectarines, so I fished around for a recipe and found yours. Thanks! (I used four, as the recipe indicates.)
The nectarines were hard but soft on the very outside – pretty typical when one lives outside of a nectarine-growing area. It’s pointless to try to get them to ripen more – that always ends in tears and tossed fruit.
I forged ahead. I peeled the nectarines because I’m not keen on stray peel, especially from underripe fruit. I then struggled mightily to extract the seed from the flesh. While ultimately successful, I wound up with randomly sized and shaped pieces of nectarine. I did not let that slow me down.
Next I got the ingredients together. Well, mostly. After I poured the eggs/milk/butter into the dry ingredients and began to stir, I realized I had forgotten the sugar! YOU CAN’T HAVE CAKE WITH NO SUGAR! Hahaha.
I made my cake in a 10-inch cast iron pan just because I can. Of course, not paying attention again, I laid all the fruit directly into the melted butter in the pan, only realizing after it was all in that I had again forgotten the sugar. Hahaha. I’m such a moron. I blame it all on the fact that this morning I had a migraine.
After plucking all the fruit back out, now covered in butter, I melted a little more butter to make up for the loss, added the brown sugar (mixed with about 1/4 teaspoon of cinnamon per the recommendations of others in this thread), and re-placed the fruit.
I put 1/2 teaspoon of ground ginger and 1/4 teaspoon of cinnamon in the dry ingredients, also per others’ recommendations.
Into the oven at 350 for 45 minutes. Tick tick tick.
At 30 minutes I took a look to make sure my oven was still at 350 and that the cake was doing as it should. It looked a perfectly nice brown – on the dark side even, so I put a piece of tinfoil over to stop the browning while it finished baking.
I was a bit nervous about the baking soda as someone else had said they thought the amount indicated in the recipe was too much but the cake rose beautifully. Like super nice, rising straight up past but not over the edge of the pan. (I think if yours rises and pours over the edges, the pan is too small or the temperature may be off?)
At 45 minutes it tested clean. Someone else said theirs had tested clean and ended up being undercooked in the middle, but I had faith and pulled it from the oven. After ten minutes, I ran a butter knife around the outside edge, flipped it over onto a plate, removed the pan, and … TADA! It came out with no sticking at all. Kind of amazing! I credit the cast iron pan for how cleanly it came out.
So then the taste. I have to say, it’s a bit of a disappointment. It’s missing something. I forgot to add vanilla – also as recommended by others – as was my intent. It may be that would have saved it. The underripe hard fruit could also be at fault, because it never has as much flavor as tree-ripened, but the fruit did cook up nice and soft. Looking at the cake, you wouldn’t think the fruit was underripe to start.
Perhaps substituting brown sugar for some of the white sugar would have helped?
It’s not a terrible cake, it’s just not great. The recipe could definitely use some serious tweaking. But thank you for posting it!
This was absolutely delicious! I’m so glad I tried it. Super easy to make too.
This was absolutely DIVINE. Made exactly as directed, except added 1 tsp of vanilla to the batter, and sprinkled cinnamon over the brown sugar before adding the nectarines. It rose beautifully, baked beautifully, and was so simple to throw together. My family loved it, and I’d be very happy to serve this to guests as well. A great recipe. Thank you!!
This was a big hit with my family. However, the bake time was off. The center was very gooey at the specified time, even though my toothpick came out clean when I tested. Next time, I will cook longer and test in several spots. It’s a super easy recipe that would be great with many different fruits.
LOVE this and the recommendations for certain allergies and variations in the remarks. Although the cast iron is my ultimate favorite, is there a variation where someone has converted this to a 13×9 size pan for larger gatherings?
Wow! This is so good! I like a lot of your recipes. You rock!
Hello ! This cake sounds and looks SO good !
How long does the cake keep in room temperature? Here, it is now 30ºC. (86 Fahrenheit) After time out in room temperature, can it be kept in the fridge? If so, for how long?
Does the cake improve/ripen over time?
Is the oven set to conventional or convection?
Thank-you !
I’ve always been terrified to attempt an upside down anything. Thank you for this. First try and it came out stunning (and yummy)!
This was great! Gooey and sweet! I didn’t have buttermilk on hand though so substituted the flour for the same amount of buttermilk pancake mix. THEN, my husband accidentally poured in too much melted butter, so we added MORE pancake mix. In the end we had to bake it about 15 min longer but we had fun making it! Thank you so much for the recipe! I can only imagine how good it will be when I actually use buttermilk!
First, let me say, I follow you on Instagram, and love your recipes! Second, I made this cake using your recipe, and it was good, but needed some flavor. So, I made it again with a few changes. I subbed light brown sugar for a 1/3 cup of the white sugar, added a tsp of vanilla extract ( I was surprised that your cake had none), and also added about 2 Tbsp of sour cream to the batter. Before adding the batter over the fruit I sprinkled about 1/2 tsp cinnamon over the nectarines, and this time I added blueberries , as well. This cake was delicious! Moist and rich and just the right amount of sweetness and the touch of cinnamon and vanilla made the natural flavors of the fruit, pop. Thank you for sharing this recipe, it was definitely good, as is!
This cake came out wonderful! As a kid, one of my favorite desserts was the pineapple upside cake my mom use to make, so I had to give this on a try especially since I was given 4 bags of nectarines and wondering what to do with them all. Lol. Even though baking isn’t one of my specialties, (kinda like a science project) it came out great! However, since I had to practice with the “nectarine slicing technique until becoming proficient”, I started out with 8 nectarines until and ended up using 5 of the best instead of 4 and yes, there was an overflow. Thankfully I used a bottom pan and saved my oven from a hectic cleanup. I do have a few questions that I did not see answers for. Does it need to be refrigerated or on the counter covered with a “cake topper or cover” or just plastic wrap and for how long or……do I need to eat it all now since I live alone? Lol
Delicious cake! I’ve made this cake twice and it’s been a hit both times. I did follow a few other readers’ suggestions: added 1tsp cinnamon + 1/4tsp nutmeg to dry ingredients, ~1tsp vanilla to wet ingredients, and decreased the amount of baking soda (probably closer to 3/4tsp total but I just eyeballed it). Definitely want to try other spices in the future – cardamom and ginger could be nice. No issues with the cake flowing over even though I still put a sheet pan underneath the 9″ cake tin, and the spices really bump up the flavor of the cake and compliment the nectarines well.
Easy to make. Absolutely delicious
Added cinnamon to batter. After reading comments, thought it might be a good idea and it was.
Served warm topped with ice cream
The nectarine/brown sugar part of the cake tastes perfect- but the base of the cake is a bit lacking in flavor for my taste- I’d add a bit of vanilla extract and consider cinnamon, cardamom or another flavor for the cake next time. I’m also not sure why, but like a few other reviewers, I used the suggested size of cake pan and my cake overflowed in the oven, so I’d consider a bigger pan or cutdown on the batter a bit next time, or use a cookie sheet to catch underneath.
Oh. My. Goodness. So easy to make and tastes, well, tastes like Heaven. If Heaven had a flavor this would be it. Ate one slice and gave the rest to the neighbor because I can’t keep that much Heaven in my house or I’ll need a new wardrobe but I plan on making it many more times with the peaches and nectarines off my tree this season.