This pineapple upside down cake has become a family favorite! It's comprised of a tasty yellow cake recipe then topped with a buttery brown sugar topping. Moist on the inside, sweet on top, and crunchy on the edges. Just the way we like it!
Preheat the oven to 375 degrees and center rack in the oven. Spray 13x9 baking pan with Pam Cooking Spray.
Prepare the topping first by placing 1/2 cup butter in prepared pan. Place in the oven until the butter has melted, this only takes a few minutes.
Remove pan from the oven and sprinkle 2 cup of brown sugar over the melted butter. Drain pineapple chunks, reserving the juice to store any leftovers.
Gently place pineapple chunks onto the brown sugar, creating flowers with 5-6 pieces. Place a cherry in the middle of each pineapple flower. A pan this size will accommodate 6 flowers.
Prepare the cake batter by combining all batter ingredients in a mixer bowl. Mix at low speed for 30 seconds or so to incorporate, then increase speed to medium and mix for 5 minutes, occasionally scraping bowl if needed.
Do not be concerned if there are some small butter bits still in the batter, it will still bake up beautifully!
Carefully, but fairly quickly, pour the batter over the pineapples. You want to pour the batter on top, moving around as you go, so that you don’t move any of the pieces of fruit around.
Bake 35-40 minutes. The sides should be bubbly and the top will be browned. Cool for 10 minutes on a wire rack.
Place a flat cutting board over the pan, then using oven mitts, invert the pan onto the cutting board. If necessary, use an icing spatula to scoop up any topping left in the pan to patch any bare spots on top of the cake.