Oh boy! There they were on display in a heap of bags at the Grocery Outlet today, and at a bargain $1.99 each, three bags of cranberries made it into the cart, one for this cake and two for something else. I’ve been waiting to try Ben & Birdy’s Cranberry Upside-Down Cake every since my niece sent me the recipe when it wasn’t cranberry season. (I made it with rhubarb, though.*)
I used a Corningware baking dish instead of the recommended 10″ cast iron skillet. I discovered in making the rhubarb version that the very hot skillet with its handle sticking out is unwieldy in the turning-it-upside-down part of this cake. It worked just fine this way. Also, I used 3/4 cup each of unbleached, all-purpose flour and the Bluebird Grain Farms organic pasayten hard white (whole grain) flour, and substituted an orange juice/milk mix for the buttermilk. So, so delicious. The cake is light and fluffy and the caramelized cranberries are out of this world.
I’m having my piece for breakfast with some Formula 1 practice in Austin at COTA and then maybe, maybe I will bake an apple pie for later since I had it in mind until going to the store and succumbing to cranberry’s lure. The cake is long gone.
*https://mschefinseattle.com/2017/05/29/rhubarb-orange-upside-down-cake/
**http://benandbirdy.blogspot.com/2005/11/cranberry-upside-down-cake_6608.html
Ms Chef in Seattle 