A vintage pineapple upside down cake recipe

For Queenslanders, nostalgia tastes like a pineapple upside down cake made from the famous Golden Circle pineapple recipe book. Or so we thought. 

While researching for State Library’s new Cake the podcast series that launches later this year, we did a deep dive into iconic recipes like the pineapple upside down cake, lamingtons and scones. 

We searched the library for the perfect pineapple upside down cake recipe

First, out came the trusty Golden Circle Tropical Recipe Book: Every-day meals with a tropical holiday flavor from State Library’s collections. It was written around 60 years ago by Home Economist, Ruby Borrowdale. 

Cake the podcast will feature an episode about Ruby Borrowdale and her recipe for pineapple pie.

Flicking through the retro pages of Ruby’s guide to pineapple proved fruitless (pardon the pun). The upside down pineapple cake recipe was missing from the book. The search for the recipe in our collections soon became our holy grail.  

Surely, we’d have a recipe somewhere – after all the pineapple is the unofficial fruit of Queensland. 

Luckily, another search of State Library’s catalogue brought up a second edition of the Golden Circle Tropical Recipe Book. It looked like it was written after Ruby’s classic guide to pineapple cookery ... judging by the late 1970s look and feel of the photos. 

Interestingly, Ruby Borrowdale's name was not attached to this recipe book. All credit goes to Mrs Valerie Smith, Senior Home Economist, and her staff for their 'enthusiastic and skilful preparation' of the recipes. 

In this recipe book, there were 2 pineapple upside down recipes. There’s a pineapple upside down dessert in the puddings and pies section and a recipe for pineapple upside down cake in the cake section. Only a gun home economist could tell us the difference. 

Remember you’ll learn more about Ruby and how she helped Golden Circle's pineapple glut to encourage more people to buy pineapples when you listen to Cake the podcast. 

Anyway, the discovery of these recipe gems led us to ask more about the pineapple upside down cake, when it became popular and where it came from? 

When did pineapple upside down cake first come to Australia? 

Searching our collections, it’s hard to know when the recipe came to Australia. It doesn’t help our search when the same recipe is called different names. We’ve seen it called pineapple cake, pineapple turnover cake, pineapple wheel cake or simply called upside down cake.  

The first mention of the recipe in an Australian newspaper that we were able to find was in a 1926 Perth newspaper. In Queensland, the first mention of the cake, from our online search, appears in The Queenslander in 1928. 

In 1930, the Sunday Mail printed an upside down pineapple recipe supplied by Miss Eileen Robinson, of the Theatre Royal, who had 'a unique collection of special dishes, gathered during her travels as an actress the world over.' 

Upside-down Cake 

A search through Trove brings up many versions of the recipe. We thought it’d be fun to try a vintage one, the first that we could find in The Queenslander which we’ve adapted slightly.  

Ingredients 

• ½ teaspoon vanilla 
• 1 cup flour 
• 1 cup sugar 
• ¼ teaspoon salt 
• 3 eggs 
• ½ teaspoon lemon extract 
• 1 ½ teaspoons baking powder 
• 4 tablespoons cold water 

Topping 

• 3 tablespoons butter 
• 1 cup brown sugar 
• Pineapple rings 

Method 

Beat egg yolks with sugar, add water, lemon and vanilla extract. Sift dry ingredients and add to mixture. Beat well 5 minutes. Fold in well-beaten whites of eggs. 

Preparation of the pan for baking: In an iron skillet melt 3 tablespoons full of butter and add one cup of brown sugar. Do not heat. In this, arrange slices of pineapple until bottom of the skillet is well covered. 

On this pour the cake batter and bake in a moderate oven about 45 minutes. When removed from the oven invert on a platter. The pineapple makes the icing for the cake. Serve with whipped cream. 

You'll love Episode 2 of Cake the podcast where we deep dive into some  juicy sweet cake history!

How do you flip a pineapple upside down cake? 

The trick is to have a well-greased cake pan. After removing the cake from the oven, slide a knife or spatula to loosen the cake around the pan. Put a serving plate on top of the cake pan and flip the cake upside down to show off the caramelised pineapple.  

Where did the pineapple upside down cake come from? 

The pineapple upside down cake was invented in America. We owe a debt of thanks to the land of the free. What have the Americans ever done for us? They gave us the cheeseburger … and they also gave us caramelised pineapple rings dotted with bright red maraschino cherries baked on top of a plain sponge cake. 

A quick trawl online brings up all sorts of interesting facts about the pineapple upside down cake. For example, the cake is like a distant cousin of the French tarte Tatin which is made from apples and is also flipped upside down when served. 

In America, recipes for upside down cakes made in cast iron skillets have been around since the 1800s but the recipe truly flourished in the mid-1920s thanks to Dole – a Hawaiian pineapple cannery which promoted its tinned pineapple through recipe competitions. 

There is even a National Pineapple Upside Down Cake Day, celebrated every year on 20 April. 

If you're interested in learning more about pineapple cakes and the world of Golden Circle recipe books, check out our list of handy references.

Find out more about pineapple upside down cake

Golden Circle Tropical Recipe Book: Every-day meals with a tropic holiday flavor. (1970). Golden Circle Cannery. https://onesearch.slq.qld.gov.au/permalink/61SLQ_INST/11l3i0/alma99183858563202061 

Golden Circle tropical recipe book. (1970). Golden Circle Cannery. https://onesearch.slq.qld.gov.au/permalink/61SLQ_INST/tqqf2h/alma9914697884702061  

Honorable Mention. (1926, June 20). Sunday Times (Perth, WA : 1902 - 1954), p. 4 (Fourth Section). Retrieved July 25, 2023, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article58243862  

Eileen Robinson's Recipes (1930, January 26). Sunday Mail (Brisbane, Qld.: 1926 - 1954), p. 19. Retrieved July 25, 2023, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article97663730  

Kitchen Lore, The Queenslander (Brisbane, Qld.: 1866 - 1939) 12 January 1928, p.53, from https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/22942893  

"Pineapple Upside DownCake Recipe and History". What's Cooking America. Retrieved 25 July, 2022.  

5501, Ruby Borrowdale Papers, John Oxley Library, State Library of Queensland, Australia.