RHUBARB UPSIDE DOWN CAKE
A tribute to my mom on her 80th birthday, and the cake that defines my whole childhood
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Hello,
When I was a child in suburban Illinois, my mom (like her mom before her) showed us her love through baking. She made deep, dark fudgy brownies for picnics and potlucks, flaky pies for every holiday, cookies after school, and two-layer chocolate cakes for every single family member’s birthday. But even though she only made it just once or twice a year—the cake that defined my childhood was her Rhubarb Upside-Down Cake—perfuming the whole household with the scent of her love.
Whenever we were coming in from the backyard (her four kids) or work (my dad), we knew it would be a very good night in our home.
The makings of this cake is as clear as any memory I have of childhood. Mom would send my brother and me outside to collect the rhubarb, a trust task that involved us wielding her small, well-worn pairing knife. I can feel the thick, lush green grass underfoot as we stood in the corner of the yard, snapping off fat stalks from the leafy plant that grew up over our heads. We’d rush inside to bring our haul to Mom, and she would reward us with a tiny Dixie cup of granulated sugar and half a ruby stalk to dip inside. We’d wait by her side and watch plump chunks of rhubarb fall away as she’d rock her Chicago Cutlery rhythmically against the cutting board. I can see her tossing together rhubarb and sugar, smell the caramelized sugar-rhubarb mixture. I know the shape of my dad’s big, strong hand as he spooned out six bowlfuls and drizzled fresh cream over each, steamy portion. To me, this cake is innocence and childhood. It is safety and love.
Later, in my twenties, I made mom’s beloved cake for Daniel Boulud and Remy Funfrock during family meal at Café Boulud, where I worked on the pastry line. As anyone who has ever worked the line in the French kitchen knows, the tone toward the executive chef from their line cooks is a dangerous blend of fear and admiration, one that had me constantly on my toes. I stepped forward sheepishly with a portion for Remy. He raved, asking my permission to put it on the menu, and making me, the normally silent new pastry cook, feel like a sudden star. (An early lesson to always be proud of where we come from.
In the years that followed, I proudly made this cake for friends and colleagues far and wide, including my friend Nikki while we were working side by side at Food Network many years ago. Knowing I wanted to save the recipe to include in my own cookbook one day, I shared it with her, but with the promise never to reveal its contents — especially the secret ingredient—marshmallows.
Packaged miniature marshmallows go against all the principles of fresh, local, seasonal food. But you’ll have to forgive yourself for that. They are the magic ingredient in this irresistible cake, which brûlée into an alluring crust along the top of the cake, balancing the tart, tender rhubarb that’s making its fleeting appearance in our gardens and markets as we speak.
Nikki kept her promise and our secret until years later, when, while running the kitchen at The Martha Stewart Show, she made this cake for Martha Stewart herself. Martha loved the cake and wanted to know its origins. By then, I had published the recipe in my first book, The Newlywed Cookbook, which is 15 years old this year. Shortly afterward, Martha invited me—AND MY MOM!!!—on the show to bake the cake and make my viral side-by-side. Thousand Layer Chocolate Chip Cookies. It’s still a career mother-daughter highlight, and a picture of me, Martha, and mom (which I apparently do not have a copy of) hangs on my mom’s kitchen wall.
The cake, though, as sweet and wonderful as it is, pales in comparison to my mom herself, who turned 80 years old last week. I’ve been missing her all week, wishing to erase the 900 miles between us this week as we celebrate both her birthday and Mother’s Day. What I wouldn’t give to hold her soft hand this Sunday.
For sure, the quickest way I know to feel close to her is to fill my house with the smell of her famous cake—the same one her mother had made for her on a rolling farm in central Iowa when she was a little girl, eight decades ago.
Below, find a tribute to my mom (who my Dad has called “as sweet as honey” for as long as I can remember) and the recipe for her beloved cake. Make it for someone you love this weekend.
xx
Sarah
A TRIBUTE TO MY MOM, on her 80th birthday
For the first 18 years of my life, my mother was never far from my reach: home with us, driving us places, cooking for us, rubbing our feet, wiping our tears, fixing our boo-boos, spending her days teaching us to sew and bake cookies and also what it means to be a person of integrity– sewing layettes for teen mothers year after year, showing up for her friends, welcoming a new neighbor or a new baby or mourning a lost parent or friend.
We witnessed her love in our home daily, and how it extended beyond to our neighbors, our community, and our church again and again.
Later, I moved away to Missouri for college, to Ireland for study abroad and finally to New York just days after college graduation, where I have stayed— yet, as I look through all the photos of the last 25 years there she is, in all the important moments: when I had my heart broken in college (without even hearing the details, she hopped into the car and drove 9 hours to spend the night with me), when I got my car towed three times in my first two weeks living in New York City (she flew out, drove the car back home and sold it to cover my rent money), when I met my husband, when I had my first baby (and labored for 44 hours!), and when I brought my second baby home (to a tiny 400 square apartment, where she slept at our feet on an air mattress, new parents and newborn and our toddler all within her reach). She was there while writing my first book, and then my second (taking care of baby Greta by my side), when I appeared on the Martha Stewart Show (a career highlight for us both), when we launched our business, when we showed Andras’ work at our first Field and Supply (with baby Matyas by our side), for each kiddo’s annual birthdays, baptisms, dance recitals, and soccer games, and through magical trips together to Hawaii and Mexico.
Somehow she found a way to be there for all of our important moments, steady and loving with her soft hands, her warm smile, and her gentle tone— always welcoming of our new chapters, new friends, and new challenges, never judgmental, no matter our life choices.
The last few years have been a challenge. Cancer (twice) and Parkinson’s have taken so much from my mother’s body—her ability to travel comfortably and attend to all the moments—but her spirit is untouched, loving, generous, uncomplaining, and kind. In any situation, she is usually the most in pain but somehow also the most giving, the most patient, and loving among us. What a gift.
When I was in my early 20s, well before I became a mother myself but after I no longer felt like a child, I asked my mom to look through the trunk that she kept near her bed in her room. Inside, there were baby blankets, tiny bonnets, and miniature hospital bracelets from all four of her children’s births. Underneath were layers of another life—before us: scrapbooks from her nursing school years, pictures with a handsome boy and his fancy sports car (a first boyfriend), pictures of my dad and her laughing, cuddling, and canoeing—my mom in a bikini and sweet-nurses-era long bob—in their dating era, before they married.
It was then that I realized that there was so much more to her than I ever knew and understood during the years she was putting herself on the back burner to give us everything. There was always more to the story—career and life ambitions, deep and connected friendship, giddiness and laughter, and that carefree spirit that so often has to be put away once children come on the scene. Somehow, for all of these years, she let it be about us and then about her grandkids, never shining the light back on herself.
Today—on her 80th birthday—I wish all the lights on my sweet, beautiful, kind, gentle angel of a mother.
I love to think of her as a little girl, all sweetness and blonde curls (where I’m guessing my son’s came from in his own toddlerhood), swinging on an old wooden slat swing under the Eastern Cottonwood tree on her family farm in Iowa, her body light and free from pain. I imagine her chasing chickens and reading books, and waddling out to the back 40 to pull up a piece of rhubarb for the cake her mother taught her. I see her there, sitting down to a warm piece of Rhubarb Upside Down cake drizzled with fresh cream from their own cows and feeling safe and loved.
Happy Birthday, Mama!! You are deeply, deeply loved. xo Sarah
Mom’s Rhubarb Upside Down Cake
Excerpted from The Newlywed Cookbook Copyright © 2012 Sarah Copeland
5 tbsp/70 g unsalted butter {plus more for the pan}, at room temperature
1 1/4 cups/140 g cake/soft-wheat flour
1 1/4 tsp baking powder
1 3/4 cups/350 g sugar
1/4 tsp fine sea salt
1/2 cup/120 ml whole milk
1 large egg, beaten
1 tsp pure vanilla extract
4 large stalks rhubarb, cut in 1/2-in/12 mm pieces (about 4 cups/2 kg)
Handful of miniature marshmallows
High-quality vanilla ice cream, for serving
Heavy/double cream {optional}, for serving
Preheat the oven to 350˚F/180°C/gas 4. Butter a 9-in/23-cm-square baking pan.
Whisk together the flour, baking powder, 3/4 cup/150 g of the sugar, and salt in a medium bowl. Mix in the 5 tbsp/70g soft butter with a fork or your fingers. Whisk together the milk, eggs, and vanilla in a small bowl. Add the milk mixture to the flour mixture, using a fork to bring all together into a loose batter.
Toss together the rhubarb, the remaining 1 cup/200 g sugar, and marshmallows in a medium bowl; spoon in an even layer in the prepared baking pan. Spoon the batter over the top in an even layer. The batter will drip down between the rhubarb, allowing some of the rhubarb to show. Don’t worry if some of the marshmallows and rhubarb show; they will melt into a caramelized crust as the cake cooks.
Bake in the center of the oven until the rhubarb is bubbly, the top is puffed and caramelized {slightly golden-crisp in spots}, and the cake springs back lightly when touched, about 40 minutes.
If you can resist the intoxicating smell, let the cake cool for a few minutes on a rack. Then spoon out into small bowls, flipping the cake so the rhubarb side faces up, and serve with a scoop of vanilla ice cream or a drizzle of fresh cool cream over the top (or both!).
SERVES 8
TO STORE: If you are lucky enough to have any leftovers (rare in our house), this cake will keep for 2 days at room temperature, wrapped in film or aluminum foil.
ABOUT MY BOOKS
My Four Books!! Thank you to all of you have bought and supported my books over the years, and a special thanks to those who have written reviews for them on Amazon, which goes a long way to support authors. If you don’t have it already, this is a great time to buy The Newlywed Cookbook for someone you love this spring. (Those 500 Four-Star reviews don’t lie!)
Photos and recipe from The Newlywed Cookbook. Copyright © 2026 Sarah Copeland/Edible Living. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this site’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited.
So good 😍😍
What an absolutely beautiful tribute to your Mom! It’s easy to see why you’re such an amazing Mom to your two, you sure had a wonderful model! Have a sweet, sweet Morher’s Day! ❤️