Sticky Date Pudding
A super moist date sponge layered with butterscotch sauce, best served warm with vanilla ice cream. Delicious, indulgent, filled with plumped dates and toffee sauce goodness.
Servings: 2 7-inch square tins
Ingredients
Date purée
- 500 g dates (pitted)
- 2 tsp baking soda
- 500 ml boiling water
Cake batter
- 3 tbsp brown sugar
- 160 g butter (softened)
- 4 eggs @ room temperature
- 2 1/2 cup cake flour
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp salt
Butterscotch/ Toffee sauce
- 1 cup brown sugar
- 500 ml heavy cream
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 100 g butter (salted)
Instructions
Date Puree
- Place dates and baking soda in a bowl. Cover with 500m boiling water and soak for 15 min.
- Add dates in 2-3 parts into the blender and blend until it becomes a beautiful date puree (see video for consistency).
Cake butter
- Cream softened butter and 3 tbsp sugar in a bowl until combined and smooth. Add eggs @room temperature - one at a time and whisk until incorporated.
- Combine the cake flour, baking powder and salt . Whisk in the flour mixture on Low in 3 parts. Whisk just to combine and do not over mix. Otherwise the sponge will be hard. Add in the dates and mix with a spatula until well combined.
- Heat up the oven to 175C. Line 2 x 7-inch square tins with parchment keeping a 1-2 inch overhang
- Pour the batter into the cake tins and smoothen. Bake for 30 minutes or until skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean.
- While still hot, poke numerous holes all over the sponge using a skewer. Spoon over generously with ~ 1/3 cup butterscotch sauce and leave to soak for 10-15 minutes. Use overhang to lift cake out. Slice and serve it warm with the remaining toffee sauce and ice cream or whipped cream.
Butterscotch sauce
- Melt butter in a heavy bottom pan. Add in heavy cream, brown sugar, vanilla essence and stir until a brisk boil on medium heat. Simmer for 1 min and take off heat.
Video
Notes
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#1 Dates
The electric blender makes life easier but the dates can also be mashed by hand using a potato masher or fork. Mash the dates well to get your date puree. This gives the pudding its deep amber colour. If it’s not well mashed, you might end up with a pale sponge cake with splotchy dates.
#2 Adding eggs
If the eggs are not @ room temperature and mixed in too quickly, it can cause the creamed butter to curdle. This happened to me when I was in a hurry to put it to bake in the oven. To fix it, microwave the batter for ~ 30sec on low/defrost mode. Once the curdling stops, whisk for 3-4 minutes until slightly thickened. Then add flour and date purée and bake as per the recipe.
#3 Level of sweetness
You will note that there is only 3 tbsp of sugar in the cake batter as Sticky Date Pudding is a sweet indulgent dessert from both the dates and the butterscotch/ toffee sauce. You can up the sweetness by adding more sauce. Or to reduce sweetness, you can 1) skimp on the sauce. Or 2) make a lighter, less sweet sauce using half the sugar, with butter and cream, as per the recipe. In this case, add some cornstarch mixture or simmer for longer for the sauce to thicken.
#4 Too much sauce?
This Sticky Date Pudding recipe probably makes more sauce than you need - but it's better to have more than less! Be generous spooning the butterscotch sauce over the sponge as it adds great moisture to the pudding. I like to keep the extras for reheating and when serving later or as an easy delicious sauce for ice cream sundaes. Alternatively, add some rum or whisky in the extra sauce and up the ooomph the next time you serve up your Sticky Date Pudding!
#5 Make Ahead
Sticky Date Pudding is great for reheating as it is very moist. It can be made ahead and stored airtight in the fridge. Before serving, just reheat and serve with the remaining warm butterscotch sauce. As it is soaked with sauce, the best way to reheat is to microwave which will keep it moist.