Pineapple Cake Recipe
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This Pineapple Cake Recipe will soon become a family favorite, perfect for celebrating the best of life’s special moments.
The salty air wafted through the screened back door and marked another warm summer day at Folly. Family was gathered at our beach to celebrate another milestone. Food was being prepared in the muggy kitchen by many hands. Sweet and savory aromas mixed with the salty breeze.
Barely able to see over the counter top, the cake was right there, just within arm’s reach. Frosting effortlessly applied with a butter knife as if it had been done a thousand times. A quick sneak of a taste may go unnoticed if I moved quick enough. A small fingertip amount would hardly be missed. Perhaps a second or third for good measure? It was white, the frosting. Maybe cream cheese, or a simple vanilla buttercream? I don’t remember, and it didn’t much matter to me. It was all the same sweet goodness in my book.
As a child a homemade cake with homemade frosting was magical. A bowl of ingredients mixed, divvied up into pans, followed by a brief stay in a hot oven to emerge as cake was amazing. As an adult it still is. How such basic ingredients can become so wonderful when combined just the right way. It really is like magic.
This Pineapple Cake is no exception to the magic flour, sugar, and eggs create. My husband, who is not much of a fan of overly sweet desserts, was a big fan of this cake. Not too sweet and so fluffy, this Pineapple Cake is perfectly balanced. The pineapple isn’t overwhelming. It’s subtle. Just right, in fact. Pair this fluffy cake with an equally fluffy frosting, like an easy 7-Minute Frosting, topped off with toasted coconut for a bit of texture, and, of course, one of the pineapple’s favorite flavor friends.
Pineapple Cake Recipe
Pineapple Cake Recipe
This Pineapple Cake Recipe will soon become a family favorite, perfect for celebrating the best of life’s special moments.
Ingredients
- 2 1/2 cups sifted cake flour (sifted before measuring)
- 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 cup pineapple juice
- 3/4 cup drained, crushed pineapple
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1/2 cup butter at room temperature*
- 1 cup sugar, divided
- 3 large egg yolks
- 3 large egg whites
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350-degrees F. Lightly grease and flour two 9-inch round cake pans.
- Sift together flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Set aside.
- In a separate bowl, whisk together pineapple juice, crushed pineapple and vanilla extract.
- In a separate large mixing bowl, cream butter and 3/4 cup sugar together until fluffy. Add egg yolks one at a time, beating after each addition until smooth.
- Alternate adding the sifted dry ingredients with the pineapple juice mixture into the butter/sugar mixture, beating after each addition until smooth.
- In a separate bowl, beat egg whites until stiff. Gradually add in remaining 1/4 cup sugar, beating until combined.
- Fold beaten egg whites into batter.
- Divide batter between the two prepared 9-inch round cake pans. Bake at 350-degrees F for 30 minutes, or until cake tester comes out clean.
- Let cake layers cool in pans for about 10 minutes, then carefully transfer to cooling racks until cool.
Notes
Makes 2 round 9-inch layers.
Frost with easy 7-Minute Frosting.
* Butter should be at room temperature. NOT melted, but soft to the touch.
I was afraid to try this recipe because I read the negative comments, but i am so glad I did not let them deter me! It is awesome. Easy to make, moist, tasty, subtle pineapple flavor, and the icing is a dream. I really love this cake, and I will definitely make it again. I also plan on using the icing for an ice cream cake! I bought a gelato cake last summer and I am pretty sure the 7 minute icing is what they put on top. What is great about it is that it does not become hard in the freezer. Anyway, thank you so much!
Thank you for the feedback, Geraldine. And a gelato cake?!? That sounds amazing!
Amy, Do you know if any of the women that weren’t successful with this cake we’re baking at high altitude? Sometimes this can cause the difference in the way things turn out if certain changes aren’t made. I know the cake mixes always say to add 1/4 of flour, possibly change the (oil or other fat) & water amounts & not to use some certain size pans. I hope they try this again especially if they are at high altitudes. This may be the cause of the problems they encountered. Hope this helps. Thank you for this recipe. Barb
I’m not sure, Barb. I know altitude as well as weather can affect baking quite a bit.
Hi Amy Pineapple cake is my favorite, but I don’t like the pineapple bits in the cake how can I have the flavor without the pineapples. I would love to try making this cake. Do have any ideal that might help me.
Without having made this cake minus the crushed pineapple, I cannot advise you on what substitution(s) to make, Ms. C.
Will this recipe work to make a bundt cake?
Hi Amy,
Just like some of the others, I was skeptical of making this cake. I’m glad I tried it though because I got two beautiful golden domed cakes! They are cooling so that I can frost them. I put a little batter in a muffin mould so I could taste it before frosting. Thank you so much for sharing the recipe!
The flavour of pineapple is very mild though. I’m thinking that’s probably because the fruit itself it mild-flavoured. Do you think increasing the quantity of the pineapples to say, 1 cup, will make a difference to the structure of the cake? I’d love to hear from you!
Your cake looks Beautiful! I will be making this in a few minutes, but before I do, I would like to say too those of you who had a bad experience with the process that you probably did something wrong and didn’t realize. Cake flour is a must and also fresh baking powder and baking soda. I made two cake in two days using all purpose flour and my boyfriend said, What is wrong with this? Both times. I bought some cake flour, my cake turned out 100% better. I hope this helps and as soon as I am done, I will post another comment. Also I didnt know you need to sift then measure……the cake flour
I made this fabulous cake for a large group this past weekend. The 50th anniversary celebration had a Hawaiian theme, so it was just what I was looking for. I had to make a few modifications, but kept the basic cake recipe. Only thing was I had to substitute Bob’s Red Mill Gluten Free 1 to 1 baking flour instead of regular cake flour. I also had to make a very large sheet cake instead of rounds. Outside of those two things, I kept everything else exactly the same. Oh, I also live at about 6,000ft above sea level! SOooo, that being said, it turned out amazing. It was light, moist and delicious. I kept hearing things like, “delicious”, “scrumptious”, etc. I did not make the 7 minute frosting because I needed to transport it a good 50 minutes or so to its destination, so was concerned that would be too fragile. Instead, I made a basic vanilla frosting for it. I substituted a little of the leftover pineapple juice for some of the milk, and of course, added the flaked coconut. Seriously, I couldn’t have been more pleased! We had a few leftovers tonight which we served to my stepdaughter and her boyfriend. The expression on her boyfriend’s face when he took his first bite was priceless. This recipe now has a permanent place in my book.
Oooh, I haven’t tried it in sheet cake form but I will be trying that soon. Glad y’all enjoyed it!
Hi Pamela can you tell me how you made the frosting sound delicious
Hi Amy I question can I replace the cream of tart with cream cheese for the icing mixture?
I made this recently and it turned out great! I didn’t really taste the pineapple so will put chunks of it in between the layers next time. The seven-minute frosting didn’t last long until it deflated (a few hours later) and got absorbed into the cake- the middle layer mainly. So I think I will fill the middle with a pineapple curd also and then frost the outside with the 7-min stuff, which was delicious!
In the recipe it calls for 1/2 cup of butter but does not specify salted or unsalted.
I would recommend unsalted, but either is okay.
Hey! I made this cake and it was a really lovely texture but I got barely any pineapple flavour from it! Is there anyway to increase the pineapple flavour without compromising the texture?
Will this recipe work as a bundt cake? And if so how much time to bake?
I’ve never made it in a bundt pan. It is very fluffy cake, so I am not sure it would be the best as a bundt.
i made this cake today for mt practical at university, cake made by the creaming method. i followed the directions to the T, cake was perfect. and i also doubled the recipe
Good flavour but my cake rised and collapsed. Won’t make again. I wont even bother icing it. Maybe I’ll make into cake pops? Who knows.
It looks amazing and I’m going to try it! Your photos are always so clear and gorgeous – they bring water to my mouth.
I made this cake for friends last weekend. Its test was very fabulous. All my friends like it. the texture of the cake is really very good. I thought to increase the pineapple flavor in this cake cause i love pineapple flavor.
can i increase the pineapple flavor without compromising the texture.
amazing recipe.
Hi, it looks delicious and I am going to make it for our family’s holiday party this Sunday.
I can’t wait to catch up with all your ‘Recipe’!!
I made this for my son’s 4th birthday (kids LOVES pineapple). It turned out PERFECT. I made one minor change to the recipe. To really pack in the pineapple flavor, I used concentrated pineapple juice (juice from the freezer section, undiluted). It was a huge hit. I wasn’t sure how it would go over, so I made a regular butter cake as well. There was one piece of pineapple left at the end of the party and 3/4 of the butter cake. I’d call that a hit.
I was on the hunt for a pineapple cake recipe, pineapples are my favorite. This recipe made a cake that was to die for! I was a little hesitant based on some of the negative reviews but I was confident in my baking skills. I followed the recipe and ended up with an amazing cake that was moist and fluffy. I highly recommend this recipe. Thanks so much for posting this!!
It was lovely experience of baking for me because I made first time on any occasion. I made the cake on the occasion of my best friend’s birthday. The pineapple flavor was really awesome. Thanks for sharing this recipe.