Easy and Delicious Cranberry Upside-Down Cake
Cranberry Upside-Down Cake: Desserts during the holidays are a must. It is the only time we get to indulge ourselves with our favorites. My recipe for Cranberry Upside-Down Cake was created because I had bought too many bags of fresh cranberries. This recipe does not have a lot of cranberries and does not contain cream of tartar.
The reason for not using many cranberries is that I believe a cake should not feel too wet as if you are eating a pudding of cranberries. The cake should be moist enough to enjoy and delicious enough to feel like you need to indulge.
The ingredients you will need to make this delicious cake
- Unsalted Butter: best to use because you can control the sodium count and it is healthier for you.
- Frozen Fresh Cranberries: much easier to use compared to fresh cranberries that need preparation.
- Packed Brown Sugar: a preferred sugar for all upside down cake.
- Orange Extract: homemade or store-bought, this extract adds flavor to the cranberries.
- Cake Flour: I prefer using SoftaSilk Cake Flour because the taste is better and it contains less sodium
- Baking Powder: a must ingredient in cake
- Sugar: best to use fine sugar or organic sugar
- Sea Salt or Kosher: use your preferred sald
- Eggs: use brown eggs if you can.
- Milk: use regular whole milk or evaporated milk diluted with water.
- Allspice: another must ingredient in fruit cakes.
- Vanilla extract: homemade or store-bought, this extract adds flavor to the cake.
A few notes about this easy cranberry upside-down cake
A tasty cake needs spices and extracts. For my Cranberry Upside-Down Cake, I opted for allspice, orange extract, and vanilla extract. The mixture of the extracts and the seasoning complement each other, and with the juice released from the cranberries, it is a world of many wonders on your palette.

I would recommend using a good brand of cake flour and ensuring that it does not contain a lot of sodium. You can also use frozen fresh cranberries that have been thawed for the recipe.
Lastly, any cake that contains fruits must be prepared in a rush. When overheated or over-mixed fresh fruit is easily broken, you may not have the time to fix the problem. Proper measuring is also required as well as a well-heated oven. I hope these tips will help you.
Enjoy my Cranberry Upside Down Cake during the holidays.
Other cake recipes you may be interested in:
Cranberry Upside-Down Cake
Ingredients
- 1/2 stick Unsalted Butter
- 2 cups Frozen Fresh Cranberries
- 3/4 cups Packed Brown Sugar
- 1/2 tablespoon Orange Extract
- 2 cups Cake Flour
- 3 teaspoons Baking Powder
- 1 cup Sugar
- 1 stick Unsalted Butter softened
- 1 teaspoon Salt sea salt or kosher
- 2 large Eggs
- 1 cup Milk
- 1/4 teaspoon Allspice
- 3/4 teaspoon Vanilla extract
Instructions
Cranberry:
- In a saucepan, melt butter and add sugar and extract. Let sugar dissolve completely. Once it starts to boil, add cranberries and gently stir to incorporate. Cook on low heat for 1 – 2 minutes so they don’t start to burst. Remove from heat and set aside.
Cake Recipe:
- Generously butter the bottom of a 9 or 10-inch pan and set aside. In a bowl, mix cake flour, baking powder, salt and allspice. In a standup mixer or a regular electric mixer, cream butter ad sugar. Add eggs one at a time until well incorporated. Add cake flour by alternating with milk and add vanilla extract last. Mix mixture at medium speed for about 1 minute.
- Spread the cranberries mixture in prepared pan. Spoon the batter over the cranberries in the cake pan, spreading it evenly.
- Bake until a skewer inserted into the center comes out clean, 35 to 40 minutes.
- Transfer the pan to a wire rack and let cool completely before carefully loosening the edges of the pan. Invert cake onto a serving plate and lift off the pan carefully. Serve with ice cream if preferred.
Notes
Nutrition
Please keep in mind that nutritional information is a rough estimate and can vary greatly based on the products used.
Nutrition info is automatically generated and provided as a courtesy and as an estimate only.
Originally published November 16, 2014. Updated to include Nutritionals