Bergamot Upside Down Cake

In my quest to enjoy all these bergamots in new-to-me ways, I've come up with this little ditty. The base of it comes from my mother's (her mother's?) pineapple-upside down cake. But then, due to some ingredient issues (no ap-flour, no milk, etc.), it's become something quite different. So next time I make the actual pineapple upside down cake, I'll post that recipe separately.

1 bergamot orange, sliced into slices no more than 1mm thick, pips (seeds) removed (save the ends to squeeze juice out of for cake part of the recipe, then blend up the rinds to make more bergamot sugar)
6 tablespoons each: butter, dark brown sugar

heaping 1 1/2 cups cake flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1/3 cup butter, room temperature
2/3 cups bergamot sugar
1 egg
1 tablespoon-ish bergamot juice
1/2 cup sour cream
candied oranges from above

In a skillet over medium-low heat, melt butter and sugar. When melted, stir until sugar is somewhat (mostly) dissolved. Add orange slices and cook for 20 minutes, decreasing heat if needed. Make sure you move them about periodically so the sugar doesn't burn (or for the rinds to get too tough). Transfer contents of skillet to baking pan, as below.

Heat oven to 350F. In an 8x8" cake pan, pour candied oranges (and the butter/sugar) and arrange somewhat neatly around the pan. Mix flour, baking powder and salt then set aside. Cream the butter, then add sugar and cream again. Then add egg and bergamot juice and mix well. Add in half the flour mixture and mix well, then add in the sour cream, mixing well once again. Add and mix in the remaining half of the flour mixture, then spread into cake pan on top of oranges (this mixture is very thick, somewhat like frosting). Bake 40-50 minutes. Remove from oven, let stand 5-10 minutes and flip over onto a plate.

Comments

  1. Dea-chan4:34 PM

    Now, THIS would have been a nice time to have pictures... :-P

    Every bergamot post you have makes me want to try and find them! But I have enough food-stuff convincing of my fiance to tackle, I don't need to add another. (He doesn't really approve of storing foods in bulk in a pantry... I'm working on this.)

    ReplyDelete
  2. Allie10:42 AM

    Here you go, DC! Sorry about the crappiness of that photo. It was a last minute thing and I forgot to fix it and put it up. :)

    You could use sweet oranges for this, or the usually easy to find Seville oranges in this, and it should be just fine too.

    You know, it's been my experience that the men-folk never understand food storage. Up until it's needed. Then it makes perfect sense to them. Though I have to wonder if the women-folk of storage-loving men have the same issues until it really is needed.

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