cake!

I actually do listen to my brothers, most of the time.  They're all really great cooks and enjoy good food.  So when my brother Rob called me a few days ago to tell me about a rhubarb cake his wife, Nick, had made recently, I listened up.  Rob said if I took this into work or to a church singles potluck, that the guys would be lining up to propose.  Everyone certainly enjoyed this cake at the singles potluck, but no proposals so far.

I give you the (Strawberry) Rhubarb Pudding Cake.

Here are the ingredients you need:

Rob recommended just doing rhubarb, but I love strawberry rhubarb pie.

Everything's better with strawberries in it.

Cut up 4 cups of rhubarb and strawberries, mix together with 1 cup of sugar and let stand while preparing the rest of the cake.  The sugar will start to draw out the natural juices of the fruit mixture.

Prepare the yellow cake mix as directed on the box.  I like the mixes with butter and not oil, because the yummy butter flavor definitely comes through and adds so much to the mix.  One tip: the butter mixes better at room temperature.  **Update: this morning while making the peach-blackberry version for work, I realized that I had left the water out of mix when I made it last time.  I compensated by adding a half cup of milk and it totally worked.  I did the same thing again this morning, because it worked so well.

Pour the batter into a well greased 9x13 inch cake pan.  Get the fruit mixture ready!

Spoon the fruit mixture evenly over the top of the cake batter.  Oh yum!

But wait!  What about that pint of heavy whipping cream from the first photo?!?!?!

Take that pint and pour the whole thing over the cake.

Keep pouring until it's all on there.  Heavy cream is sooooo good.

Stick that yummy, fruity, creamy goodness in an oven pre-heated to 350 degrees and bake it for 50-60 minutes.  As it bakes, the fruit and cream will sink to the bottom of the pan and create a creamy, sweet, fruity pudding on which the cake will float.

This is what the finished product will look like. The fruit and cream are on the bottom and they transferred their flavor into the cake as well.  The cake got a little over baked, but with the cream and fruit on the bottom it was still very moist and I think it added just a bit to the yummy-ness.  It was a hit at the potluck as well.  I took a bite and stopped in amazement at how good it was.  This is a guaranteed hit for any occassion.  Thanks for sharing the recipe Nickolee! 

Here's the recipe.
Rhubarb Pudding Cake
Ingredients:
1 two-layer yellow cake mix (Get the one where you add butter, it's better.)
4 cups chopped rhubarb (I added strawberries, 'cause strawberry-rhubard pie is the best!)
1 cup sugar (I think with other fruits less sugar would be okay.)
1 pint heavy whipping cream

Directions:
1.  Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees.
2.  Chop rhubarb (and fruit, if desired) into small pieces, combine with sugar and let sit while preparing the cake.
3.  Grease a 9"x13" baking dish.  Prepare yellow cake mix according to instructions on the box and pour into pan.
4.  Spread the rhubarb-sugar mix evenly over the top of the cake.  Be sure to get rhubarb out to the edges for more even baking.
5.  Pour the cream over the top of the cake.
6.  Bake for 50-60 minutes.  As the cake bakes, the rhubard and cream will sink to the bottom, creating a fruity, pudding like layer that is thick but runny.  The cake will bake like a normal cake, in that when a toothpick is inserted to test done-ness it will come out clean.  However, the cake will slide around a bit on the bottom layer, so it will seem as though the cake is not done.  Test the cake before removing from the oven.
My notes:  (a) The addition of strawberries to the thubarb was a great combination. However, 1 cup of sugar was a little too much sugar, as the cake and fruit mixture was very sweet.  Granted rhubarb is very tart, but I think having more of the tartness would have been better.  I'll be experimenting with sugar levels.  (b) I think there are a lot of great fruit possibilities this cake:  peaches & blackberries (I'm making this tomorrow morning for a work potluck.), or raspberries.