Monday, October 4, 2010

Date Toffee Pudding

We celebrated an important milestone this year. It falls on the day after July 4th and with a holiday on hand we are usually free to plan at leisure. This year it was a meal at one of DC's popular Indian restaurants. The restaurant stood up to its reputation and the foods was quite good. The dessert especially their Date Toffee Pudding was what impressed us all and left us wanting more. I quickly made up my mind to give it a try but it took a good three months to bring it to fruition.



I am no baker, following directions is one of the hardest things for me to do. Guess I like to be creative! Apparently that is a wrong thing to be if you want good results in baking. With some self control I managed to pull off the pudding cake without disaster.



I had bookmarked Jamie Oliver's recipe but the conversion to cups from gms was no easy task. David Lebovitz's recipe to the rescue. I used a combination of both the recipes.



Date Toffee Pudding
Ingredients
1. 3/4 cup of loosely packed pitted dates + 1 1/2 cups of water
2. 1 1/4 cups of flour
3. 3/4 cups of granulated sugar
4. 2 Eggs
5. 2 tbsp Ovaltine
6. 4 tbsp butter
7. 2 tbsp yogurt whisked
8. 1 tsp baking powder
9. 1/2 tsp salt
10. 1 Cup of raspberries


For the toffee sauce
1. 1 1/4 cups of heavy cream
2. 1/2 cup of Turbinado sugar + 2 tbsp brown cane sugar or molasses (for the lovely dark color)
3. 1 tbsp butter

Method
1. Boil 1 1/2 cups of water in a sauce pan and soak the dates for 1/2 hour, drain the water and puree the dates and set aside
2. Butter the ramekin cups or the baking dish you are planning to use and set aside. Preheat the oven to 325F
3. Sift together flour, baking powder and salt
4. Beat the butter and sugar together till fluffy. Add in the eggs and beat them together
5. Add flour and ovaltine to the butter mixture and mix well. Add in the whisked yogurt,pureed dates and mix.
6. Pour into the buttered baking dish and set in preheated oven and bake for 35 minutes. Check if it is cooked, insert a tooth pick or knife in the center and it should come back clean
7. While the pudding is baking prepare the sauce

8.Mix together cream,sugar and butter in a sauce pan. In low heat cook the sauce till it becomes dark and thick, about 30 minutes. The time depends on how thin or thick you want to sauce to be (if it sits too long in the heat it becomes toffee)

9. Once the pudding has cooled down, spoon the sauce over and serve

13 comments:

  1. I've heard good things about Rasika but haven't been there myself. Date Toffee pudding sounds awesome and I can't wait to try this.

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  2. Congrats on milestone!!! Wishing you many more to come. :)
    Love anything with dates. Pudding looks so sexy and I wish I could grab from my screen. :)

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  3. nice recipe,..but i cant view the pics,..:-(

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  4. Looking good!!! Date and toffee sounds like a nice novel combo.

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  5. Congrats, droolworthy pudding looks terribly irresistible..

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  6. One of the classic brittish pudding and i love it andthis just looks so so drooley delicous.
    Congrats on the milestone and in baking :-)

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  7. Congratulation!

    I am like you, have the greatest urge to deviate on purpose whenever there is written instructions. But i get scared in baking and usually do not mess with the proportions :)
    Sounds lip smacking good. That toffee sauce omg ...

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  8. Congrats on reaching an imp milestone in life!!!lovely yummmmy pudding...love it

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  9. Congratulations! What is turbinado sugar? Does the recipe work with regular sugar?

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  10. yummy dessert and congrats on your milestone!

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  11. Wishes for your milestone - hope you had a good time! :)

    couldnt see the pics though..

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  12. Jyothsna, turbinado sugar is raw cane sugar and unrefined. You can substitute with regular white sugar. For the sauce add a couple of tbsp of brown sugar or molasses (unrefined brown sugar - karumbu sarkarai) for the dark brown color.

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  13. best wishes for the milestone! the pudding looks so tempting.

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