Eggless Sticky Date Pudding

The moment I saw the recipe of eggless date pudding in Yum's the word, I was tempted to try it immediately. After some recipe hunting, I came up with a healthier version of an Eggless whole wheat date cake with a topping of caramel sauce!! (drool :P) Absolutely yummy! The dates that I used was sweet enough so I reduced the additional sugar in the recipe. The cake tastes yumm as such and with an additional topping of warm caramel sauce........................... do I need to say more??!! Let me jump right away to the recipe :)

INGREDIENTS:

For the cake:

• Dates - 20, de-seeded
• Sugar - 1/3 to 1/2 cup as required and depending on the sweetness of the dates used
• Milk - 3/4 cup
• Whole wheat flour - 1 cup
• Oil - 1/2 cup (I used sunflower oil, any vegetable oil could also be used)
• Baking soda - 1 Tsp

For the caramel sauce:

• Brown sugar - 1/4 cup
• Milk - 1/4 cup
• Low fat cream - 50 ml
• Butter - 2 Tbsp
• Vanilla essence - 1/4 Tsp

METHOD:

For cake:

1. Grease and dust a cake pan. Pre-heat oven to 180C
2. Soak the dates in warm milk for 3 hrs. The dates will swell and become soft 
   
3. Blend the soaked dates along with the milk into a smooth mixture. To this add oil and sugar and blend into a smooth paste in a mixer 
   
4. In a large mixing bowl sieve flour and baking soda together and make a well in between as shown 
   
5. Slowly pour the wet mixture and gently mix it with the flour. Do not over mix. Now pour in the batter into the greased and dusted cake pan 
   
6. Bake in a pre-heated oven at 180C for 20-30 minutes (Mine was done in 22 minutes)

For caramel sauce:

1. While the cake is baking, start preparing the topping
2. In a heavy bottomed pan, add milk and sugar. Mix well till the sugar dissolves
3. Add cream, butter and vanilla. Cook on a medium flame and keep stirring constantly. Bring it to a boil and once the sauce starts to thicken, remove from flame 
   

For sticky date pudding:

1. While the cake is warm, poke a few holes with the help of a toothpick and pour the warm sauce over it
2. Serve warm or it could also be refrigerated after it is completely cooled down and can be served chilled with extra sauce later!!
3. And this is how it would get over within seconds :P