Nannie’s Pineapple Cake

Prepare yellow cake mix as directed on box using the water, vegetable oil, and eggs. (Or, if you are the Martha Stewart type, prepare your favorite homemade yellow cake.)

While cake is cooling, combine the corn starch with the cool water in a coffee cup or small bowl; set aside. In a large saucepan, combine the stick of melted butter, sugar, and crushed pineapple with its syrup. Bring mixture to a boil on the stovetop over medium or medium-high heat. Stir in a little of the cornstarch-water mixture while the pineapple topping is hot. Add small amounts of the mixture until your topping reaches your desired consistency. Once the topping is the way you want it, add the vanilla. Give the mixture one final, good stir.

Pour topping over the cake while the cake is still a little warm. This can get kind of messy, so I bake my cake in a pretty 9×13″ dish, dump the pineapple topping over it, and just serve it directly out of that. This cake is so yummy, no one really cares how it’s served.

Note: This cake is not only yummy to humans. I have to hide any leftover cake in a cooled oven from my cat, Pudge. I found out the hard way that felines (well, at least my feline) enjoy this cake too. I awoke one morning to find Pudge knee-deep in pineapple cake on my kitchen floor, feasting to her heart’s content.