1954 Sticky Toffee Date Pudding

There's nothing fancy or frilly about a baked pudding. It's plain and simple but there is something deeply satisfying and supremely indulgent about a sticky pudding complete with pools of sticky toffee sauce and of course,  a good glug of piping hot custard. Something else which always accompanies a baked pudding, is a big spoonful of nostalgia. And this one, if it's even possible, comes with an extra dose. Because the recipe is over 60 years old. 

When my great aunt Gwen died recently, I was given a great gift; 3 large falling-apart boxes filled with her love of recipe hoarding and all sorts of vintage kitchen paraphernalia. There were pages upon pages of recipes - not in a book or file but just stacks of cuttings torn out of magazines, from the back of soup packets and old shopping lists, some even quickly jotted down on the back of a church hymn booklet. But it was amongst these droves of recipes, that I discovered a few real gems. 

And this recipe is one of them. 

Cape Times Newspaper - Wednesday, June 16, 1954

 Margaret Pollitt writes: 'One of the biggest problems of winter menu-planning is how to ring the changes with the sweet course - those sturdy summer standbys, ice cream, jellies and fruit salads, are of no use now to the mother whose children crave a big helping of pudding after the main course has been polished off.'

I cropped out the advert for corsetry services in the bottom right, although, in hindsight, that advert placement was very good!  

Amongst recipes for pancakes (Margaret advises budding cooks that 'tossing pancakes only comes with experience!'- you've been warned.), hot orange pudding, steamed sago pudding and roly poly, a date pud caught my attention. And it would be perfection when baked in my vintage pudding bowl (side note: how beautiful is this?!)

As a child I never appreciated puddings; I wanted to be a pastry chef and the simplicity of a baked pudding was completely lost on me. I only yearned to make the complicated, intricate desserts I saw in my cheffy cookbooks and magazines. My young imagination extended so much further than a quick-mix sponge drowned in thick UltraMel custard. How times have changed. Now... it's the very thing I crave when the weather turns wet and grim. Perhaps that's what makes pudding so universally soothing and rich in nostalgia. The fragrance of a baking pudding takes me back to Sunday afternoon lunches where we had to endure the delicious smell all the way through lunch. Torture. Followed by sheer bliss.

1954 Sticky Toffee Date Pudding
Serves 6-8

250g dried, pitted dates
250ml (1 cup) hot water
1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
250g cake flour
250g butter
1 tsp (5ml) baking powder
2 large eggs
100g (1/2 cup) brown sugar
100g toasted pecans or walnuts, chopped

Soaking syrup:
60g butter
1 cup sugar
11/2 cups milk
2-3 tbsp sweet sherry (optional, or add 1 tsp vanilla)

Preheat the oven to 180C, fan-forced 160C. 
Grease 12 small dariole moulds or ramekins or a large 26 x 16 baking dish. 
Place the dates in a medium bowl and pour over the hot water. Sprinkle over the bicarbonate of soda and allow to stand for 30-45 minutes or until very soft. 
Place the softened dates (and the water) in a food processor with the rest of the pudding ingredients (except the nuts) and blend until smooth and combined. Stir in the nuts then pour into greased individual moulds or one large dish. 
For small puddings, bake for 10-15 minutes and large pudding, 30-35 minutes or until a skewer inserted in the middle comes out clean.
In the meantime, make the syrup; place all the ingredients in a saucepan and bring to the boil. Keep hot. 
Pour the hot syrup over the puddings as soon as they come out the oven. 
Serve immediately with salted caramel sauce (recipe below), vanilla custard or thick cream. 

Salted Caramel Sauce
Makes 500ml

1 (395g) tin condensed milk 
250ml (1 cup) cream
3 tbsp (45ml) brown sugar (like Demerara or Muscovado)
Pinch of good-quality salt (I used local Oryx desert salt)

Place the condensed milk, cream and sugar in a small saucepan and stir over low heat until the sugar is dissolved. Bring to the boil and simmer, stirring constantly until golden brown. Allow to cool, then sprinkle in the sea salt. 

Sticky caramel baked puddings

If you're trying to stick to a diet, I suggest you look away now, because this is possibly the most decadent, delicious, oozy, luscious baked pudding in my repertoire - so unctuous it comes with its own warning. No surprise then that it is based on a recipe by the anti-diet diva herself, Nigella. Caramel is my latest obsession and it seems toffee trumps chocolate in the food world these days so this is my ode to the caramel fad. With a few white chocolate chunks thrown in for good measure, of course.

Eating healthily and living a balanced, active lifestyle is an important part of my life, but there are occasions that demand a pudding of this calibre. Like those freezing weekends when it pours with non-stop rain and you seek the refuge of your duvet and live in your slippers for 2 days or those Monday evenings when only something supremely sweet will cure a terrible case of the Monday blues. And if anything, it will be the best dessert to impress friends with – super easy and you can casually say 'caramel is the new chocolate you know' , because it totally is.

Sticky caramel baked puddings

(serves 4)

200g dark brown sugar

350g self-raising flour

1 cup milk

2 eggs

2t vanilla extract

100g butter, melted

200g white chocolate chunks

200g tinned caramel

50g butter

4 cups boiling water

Combine the dark sugar and flour. Whisk the milk, eggs, vanilla and melted butter together and pour into the flour mix, stirring to combine. Fold in the chocolate chunks. Divide between individual moulds – filling up to halfway. Combine the caramel, butter and boiling water and pour over the puddings. Bake at 180°C for 25 minutes until the tops are firm to the touch. Serve with caramelised banana slices, if desired and top with marscarpone or whipped cream.

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