Winter 2023Sticky toffee pudding

by Natasha Brown - owner of Brown’s Cakes

My husband, Tony, doesn’t like Christmas pudding (I know, fool!), so, every year we have sticky toffee pudding as well as the traditional Christmas pud on our Christmas table.

This isn’t a heavy sticky toffee pudding recipe so you should be able to squeeze a bit in after your Christmas dinner!

Ingredients

For the sponge:

• 125g dates
• ¾ tsp bicarbonate of soda
• 90ml boiling water
• 65g butter + extra for greasing tin
• 110g dark brown sugar
• 2 eggs
• 125g self-raising flour
• 65g treacle
• 1tsp vanilla extract
• 1tsp mixed spice

For the topping:

• 75g dark brown sugar
• 1 tbsp treacle
• 30ml double cream

Or double everything if you want lots of sticky sauce to pour over!

For the pudding start by preheating the oven to 160°C.

Grease an 8” square tin (use a tin with low sides, about 2” deep if you want to serve the pudding in the tin. You can use a loaf tin but this will make a deeper pudding and will take longer to bake).

Soak the dates for about 10 minutes in the boiling water along with the bicarbonate of soda and then blend together to form a paste.

Beat the sugar and butter together really well until the mixture turns golden.

Add a tablespoon of flour to the mixture and gently beat in an egg, repeat this for the second egg.

Add the flour, mixed spice and treacle and gently beat together.

Pour into the greased tin and bake for 35/40 mins until it looks baked. Don’t be tempted to open the oven door before it looks baked as this might cause it to sink.

Check the cake is cooked by inserting a wooden skewer and checking that it comes out clean. If it doesn’t, keep the cake in the oven and check again after five minutes.

To make the topping, put all the ingredients in a heavy saucepan and gently heat. Let it boil for a minute or two.

You can pour the topping over the pudding and serve it in the tin or let the pudding cool a little before tipping it onto a serving dish and pouring the topping over. If you make double the topping, you could put half in a small jug and serve with the pudding for those who like extra sauce.

If you are buying dates and treacle etc. you will have more than enough to have a trial run before Christmas to alleviate the stress on Christmas day.

You can also plan to make the pudding the day before and warm it in the oven or microwave on the day. Try it beforehand to practise, to see how it warms and to enjoy!