Tuesday, June 17, 2014

Eggless Date Walnut Cake | Low- Calorie Cake Recipe

This Date and Walnut cake is truly indulgent bursting with the flavours of sweet dates and crunchy walnuts. As an added treat, it has some semi-sweet choco chips too! For those who love those Bakery Style Plum Cake / Christmas Cake in India, this is surely gonna be its best Eggless alternative. Unlike regular airy cakes, this Date Walnut Cake is rich, moist and dense, nevertheless it tasted just too delicious. I chose this recipe for the first day of week 3 of Blogging marathon under the theme 'Iron-rich recipes for kids'. Kids definitley would love Cakes, but instead of regular butter-sugar laden ones, I always seek for healthier recipes so that they can enjoy it guilt-free. This cake is loaded with vitamins and Iron from generous amount of Dates and Walnuts. My kids enjoyed every bite of it and especially my dear brother who was always  skeptical about such healthier treats also got addicted to this cake. I think that was absolute success with this recipe!

Preparation time - 20mins
Baking time - 45-55mins
Yields - One 9*5 inch Cake
Adapted from - Vegrecipesofindia
Ingredients:-
Dates - 1cup, pitted and chopped
Milk - 1cup
Instant coffee powder - 2tsp
All-purpose flour - 2cups
Baking powder - 1tsp
Baking soda - 1/2tsp
Salt - a pinch
Any vegetable oil - 1/2cup
Demerara sugar - 3/4 cup, packed
Water - 1/2cup
Vanilla extract - 1tsp
Walnuts - 1/2cup, chopped
Semi-sweet choco chips - 1/2cups

Method :-

1.  Heat the milk, add coffee powder and soak the Dates for 15mins. Pre-heat oven to 180C / 350F.

2.  Combine flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt with a whisk.

       

3.  Add the soaked Dates-milk mixture, sugar,  oil, water and vanilla essence and whisk until just incorporated without lumps. Avoid over-mixing.

4.  Fold in the walnuts and choco-chips and pour the mixture into a greased cake tin. Bake for about 45-55mins at 180C until a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean. Also, you will find the cake leaves the sides of the tin.

       
5.  If you notice the top getting too browned while the cake is still getting done, you may cover it with an aluminium foil as below and bake until its completely done.

       

       

Let it cool completely before slicing it up with a serrated knife. The cake becomes more soft and tastes awesome the next day or after a few hours. Enjoy!

Happy to send this to Valli's Kid's Delight event hosted by Kalyani for Iron-rich Recipes for Kids this month.

Notes :

1.  You can use 1cup each of All-purpose flour and Whole - wheat pastry flour.  In that case, increase the liquid content, here its the water to 3/4cup. 

2.  Regular sugar can be used in place of Demerara sugar. But, I prefer Demerara sugar for this recipe as it lends a unique caramel flavour just as in these Choco-chunk cookies.

3.  As I loved to have Bakery-style cake slices, I had used the 9*5" loaf tin here and hence the more baking time. You may choose to use a regular 7" round pan too and the baking time will reduce a little. Start checking from 30mins onwards.

4.  Adding choco-chips is optional. Though it contributes to the rich taste, omitting it will not affect the texture of the cake.

7 comments :

  1. What a rich and moist cake filled with healthy ingredients.. Looks amazing.

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  2. Wow the cake looks so moist and inviting...Will surely want to try this for my kids..

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  3. Would love to have few slices of this very nutty and super moist cake.

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  4. I am ready for eggless bakes and this looks tasty !

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  5. looks yum! perfect to go with Tea / coffee

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  6. Wow! a moist cake and a healthy one too.

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