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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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.
Hella hella good! I understand how you gained 5 pounds.
Entire family loved It! They all said it was the perfect amount of sweetness. They loved the chewy edges.
I followed recipe mostly but added a bit of Vanilla and cardamom. Will do again. It’s a keeper.
I just made this for a meal with a friend and I have to say, it was DIVINE! Everything about it was just right. I made it gluten free because I’m celiac, and I added 1/2 teaspoon ground ginger to the cake mix – that little hint of ginger was lovely paired with the nectarines. It’s now on my favourites list and will have to be made again soon. And again after that…. Thank you!
The cake was delicious and easy to make. I can’t eat wheat or dairy, so I substituted gluten-free flour, margarine and used almond milk and lemon juice for the buttermilk. It turned out beautifully! Definitely a keeper! Thank you!
I made this cake and it turned out
Can you freeze it.? With just the two of us I don’t think it would do us any good to eat it all in one sitting
Made a frequent mistake of buying a pallet of Nectarines at Costco. In my defense they looked and taste so good but with only two of us there was no way we would eat them all. Along came this recipe. I made the cake following the exact instructions and it was a huge hit. The cake was not only beautiful but super delicious. This one is a keeper and I will make it again and again. Now about all those plums I had earlier in the year. Hummmm? Maybe they would work too.
Hahahaha the exact reason I am here, the smell stopped me in my tracks at Costco.
I just made this and it turned out delicious!!! I did make some modifications to make it healthier … i) only used 4 tbsp butter for the batter and I lined my pan with parchment paper which avoided the need for the additional butter ii) used 3/4 white sugar for batter instead of 1c, iii) halved amount of brown sugar, iv) didn’t have buttermilk so I used 1 cup milk and 1tbsp white vinegar instead v) lastly added 1/2 tbsp vanilla to wet ingredients. End result it tasted more tart than sweet but I loved it that way! Thank you!!!
PS do you think this will freeze ok?
Excellent! I adapted it as follows to make it just a little bit healthier:
1 1/2 c. all-purpose flour plus 1/2 c. whole wheat flour
Reduce sugar to 1/2 c., add 1/2 cup pear puree
1/2 tsp. almond extract
I feel like ice cream will be too much, so I’m serving with freshly whipped cream!
Another wonderful recipe! My cake leaked quite a bit of the sugary liquid base in a shallow 9″ cake pan, so I will place a sheet underneath to catch potential drips or use a deeper pan next time. The cake was very moist and delicious warm (w/ice cream, duh) or cold. Fun fact: if you don’t have buttermilk, you can imitate it by adding a tablespoon of white vinegar to a cup of regular milk, which worked wonderfully (although out of this world with real buttermilk, I’m sure). Added a bit of vanilla, cinnamon, and tiny amount of nutmeg…soooo good!
This was very tasty, thank you! I didn’t have quite enough nectarines, so I decided to throw in some blueberries too. They were yummy, but did make the base/top very dark purple. The texture of this cake was dense and moist. Lovely!
The best! Better than cobbler. I put sliced almonds on top of batter before baking. Love the cake recipe! thanks
Delicious and beautiful!
*We didn’t have the buttermilk nor baking soda so used heavy cream and 1tsp baking powder. Turned out great!
Scrumptious!!!
This was amazing! I made it with Bob’s Red Mill Gluten Free 1-1 flour and it was mind blowing. And so pretty! It made me feel like a professional. The only difference is that I peeled the nectarines. Thanks for an awesome recipe I can use to impress people!
Does anyone know if you can make this with overly ripe nectarines?!
I also want to know this! lol
I just baked this last night with super ripe nectarines and it came out amazing! 🙂
I was given some Nectarines, to many for us to use
And they were ripe. I used your recipe for Nectarine
Upside down cake. It is amazing, I would never guess
It would be that wonderful. Thank you so much!
I followed the recipe to the T- It came out beautiful and delicious!
This was the first cake I have ever successfully baked myself from scratch after a lot of fails. This is super easy and DELICIOUS WOW! I will never look at a bag of nectarines the same ever again. I plan on making another one tomorrow
Could I use defrosteed peaches from my freezer?
Super easy and delicious
Made this cake as I had almost 5 kg of nectarine from the market. Wanted to something other than jam. Well , followed the recipe it came out delicious wanting to dig in for more. I used 250ml as 1 cup and melted 125g butter. Not sure how much is 1 stick. Used more than 1/2 of melted butter in the batter and some generously on the cake tin base.
What can we replace eggs with and the measurement for the replacement ingredients?
Caramelised nectarine juice. yum. I had been wondering what to do when I had a whole tree of nectarines come ripe on the same day. After letting the lorikeets have a few, I made a double batch of this recipe, hoping it would last my family of five a week. Next day after brekkie, it was gone. Proofs in the pudding, or in this case, the cake.
Has anybody tried this recipe with apples?
Me and my family absolutely love this recipe. It is delish.
A friend served this at our backyard cookout! Everyone went straight for the brownies, which left this yummy goodness. I seriously ate 3 pieces and immediately asked for the recipe!!
Can’t wait to make it for myself or I mean “family”
Trying other fruits as well. A perfect dessert instead of chocolate!! Thanks
Tried the recipe today and it turned out beautifully, I added a little vanilla to give it an added taste.
I have it in the oven baking right now! I already gave it 5 star’s because I know it’s going to taste delish. I had 5 nectarines so used the extra one. I added a little cinnamon & vanilla but otherwise kept it the same. My batter is nice & thick plus put a foil lined cookie sheet under the cake pan…just in case! 🙂 Thanks for what I’m sure is going to be a gr8 cake.
Seeing the reviewer who experienced too much baking soda taste, I did a little research and found that a good guideline for baked goods is 1/4 t baking soda per cup of flour. Thus, when I made this, I used only 1/2 t of soda based on 2 c flour. It came out great – no problem with rising and no soda taste.
Hi CHUNG-AH, I followed your recipe to a tea and it worked out perfectly. Thank you !
You are so welcome!
I love this recipe, however, the amount of butter is intolerable for an IBS sufferer like myself–something I unfortunately discovered after the first time with this recipe. On my second time around, I used the 4 tbsps of butter in the batter, but only **greased** the cake pan with butter. I found the result just as delicious as the first iteration, albeit the discomfort and suffering of too rich a dessert! 😉
How did you measure your flour? I think the issue I (and probably others) had with the batter may lie in how the flour is measured. Did you scoop with the measuring cup and then level it off, or did you spoon the flour into the cup then level? I had saw someone test the two ways on another site, and it can amount to up to 1/3 cup difference in the amount of flour used between the two methods.
The flour was leveled off.
So very good! Made it as written and it came out perfectly. I did place a foil lined cookie sheet underneath to catch any overflow, which did happen. Will make again with different fruits and spices. Thanks for a great recipe.
I tried this tonight, but used up some pea milk (Ripple) instead of buttermilk as it didn’t seem fresh enough for coffee. I also added about half a cup of maple syrup to the batter. I’ll make it again but will make only half the batter. I’ll also add a bit of cardamom or cinnamon to the fruit part. Thanks for the idea! It was a winner.
Your additions/changes sound delicious!
it’s cooking right now and reminds me similar of a pineapple upside down cake only difference I did was add 1 and a half teaspoons of vanilla. wasn’t brave enough to do without it. after tasting the basic batter I could see something was off so I added the vanilla and it instantly tasted like cake batter. Lol. I’m set in my ways i guess but i’m sure it will taste good.
How did it turn out?
Hey there , just made this cake and it turned out amazing ! My little one has an egg and dairy allergy . So I made the cake vegan , I substituted the buttermilk for almond and the eggs for flax eggs .
Seriously so good !!
Just made this cake and realized as I put it in the oven.. I forgot the salt while constantly chasing my toddler out of the kitchen.. otherwise I followed the recipe exactly and I’m excited but also nervous to take it to a family bbq.. we’ll see how it turns out! Thank for this recipe! I will try it again soon to the T!
This was delicious!! I also added some cinnamon and vanilla extract. Used slightly less white sugar than called for because I wanted to swirl some jam into the bottom just to add a little more color when it was sliced. It was a fun addition! I’ll definitely use this recipe again and with other fruits, it was really easy and beautiful and delicious!
That’s so great to hear, Rosalee! Thanks for your feedback.
Awesomely delicious! Thanks so very much from Canada!
Nectarine upside down cake in the oven 🙂 I added 1/2 tsp of cinnamon and probably 2 tsp of vanilla. I can’t wait to eat it. Thank you Chungah
What size cake pan did u use?
I used a 9-inch cake pan.
I followed the recipe to a tee and the cake turned out great. I think that next time, I will have a thicker layer of nectarines so that the cake is moister. I did not have any issues with the cake spilling the butter over the top. I think that the brown sugar did a good job absorbing it. Yum!
Hi! The recipe says serve immediately but I was wondering if you can make a few hours in advance… will it still be ok?
Yes, of course!
I just made this and found the cake quite dense. I followed the recipe perfectly so was just wondering if anyone else had this experience and what to do about it.
How long will this keep on the countertop? Does it need to be refrigerated?
Hi, I tried this recipe and it came out well. However, it has a funky smell to it and I’m not sure if the smell is normal as it has fruit in it or if I did something wrong!
Such a pretty and delicious cake, and very easy to make! Came right out of the baking dish when flipped. Perfect balance of tart and sweet. I will definitely make it again!
I made this and wow!!!!
Thanks for the recipe! The cake was yummy! Making it again right now.
It’s killing me that I have to wait for my husband to come home to cut into this!
I had a thought about people who complained about a runny batter. Possibly they didn’t shake the buttermilk before measuring? That could be an explanation, also maybe used jumbo eggs? Definitely was not an issue for me.
I can always depend on you for wonderful recipes, I recommend your site to all my friends!
I made this today and it was delicious! My pan was pretty full so I put a baking sheet under as a precaution and I did have some butter and sugar bubble over, but it all worked out and was great.
Thanks for the easy yummy recipe!
Really lovely recipe. With my oven could have done with a slightly lower temperature as it seemed ready but the when I turned it out the top was slightly under but just popped it back in for another 10 mins and it was delish! My while family loved it and I’ll defo be making again and trying a peach/pineapple version.
Can you use apricots?
Yes, absolutely.
I baked this cake recipe twice successfully! Thanks Chungah.
Hi, I was looking forward to making this cake with my daughters and we did. However when I placed it in a springform pan and as soon as I put it in the oven the butter was dripping out of the bottom of the pan and fumed up the entire house. It was very inconvenient with the smells in the house and dirty oven. Is there a way to make the cake without so much butter poured on the bottom of the cake to prevent dripping? Thanks!
As an update, after getting the fumes out of my house and cleaning out the oven, I stuck the cake back in to bake and it came out delicious! I placed the springform pan onto a baking pan to prevent butter from dropping.
I have found that wrapping the lower half of a springform pan with aluminum foil helps control leakage.
I have my cake in the oven and its fragrance is wafting thru the neighborhood now…. 🙂 My batter was not thick as your picture was. I used the recipe’s exact measurements. I placed a pan under the cake so if there were any drips they would end up on the pan. Can’t wait until it is done!
First let me say that I have been baking for many years and I collect recipes and I thought my husband would enjoy this cake. With this being said, I followed the recipe to the letter, my batter looked nothing like what is shown, it was like pancake batter. With the batter being thin I baked an extra 10 minutes which was not enough time, totally I baked an extra 20 minutes. I have let the cake cool for 30 minutes and my husband is going to taste test. My husband is the best taste tester there is, he does not hold back with his truthful comments, good or bad. His comment was OK. I always try a recipe more than once so I will try again. My verdict is still out.
Trease, thank you for trying my recipe, and for your honest feedback, although I’m not entirely sure why the batter was so thin! As you can see from the images here, the batter is supposed to be very thick.
I made this tonight with frozen peaches and it was delicious! Thank you!!
This looks amazing!! Can you substitute peaches?
Yes, absolutely!
Hey! I made this recipe today for Easter and it turned out perfect! I was a little nervous as I don’t bake often at all. Your instructions were spot on and this turned out to be such a wonderful dessert. You always have the most reliable recipes 🙂
Thanks for this recipe, I tweaked it and shared it with my Dutch readers! http://www.mamawijs.nl/overrijpe-nectarines-3-heerlijke-recepten/
Hi Chung, I made this recipe today and my cake rose above my baking pan causing the butter drip over and smoke my oven, which is fine, I just have to clean it next time I use it. My main concern is even though the recipe only calls for 1 tsp of baking soda, I could smell the baking soda as soon as I cut into the cake and it was all I could taste. Did I do something wrong?
Lily, it’s very difficult to answer what went wrong since I was not in the kitchen with you. 1 tsp of baking soda is not a very large amount and is generally tasteless so I am not sure what you were tasting. You can also use a springform pan for next time to avoid batter dripping over the top.
Hi, just wanted to share a trick my mom taught me when baking with baking soda. Place the amount of baking soda needed into a small bowl and pour a little vinegar over it. Then add it to the batter. It still allows the cake to rise but doesn’t leave the baking soda taste in the cake. Hope that helps!
Doesn’t the buttermilk have the same effect?