This Healthy Sticky Date Pudding is a surprisingly light and airy dessert that won't leave you feeling like you need to undo a button. A modern take on a traditionally heavy and dense dessert. Simple ingredients, 20 minutes of prep, and it stays moist for days.
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What Makes This Recipe A Winner?
- Its light, soft and has a subtle caramel sweetness
- There's no sugar, just Dates
- Perfect for Christmas gatherings, or eating all year round
- Make one big cake or individual servings
- Stays moist for days and won't dry out
Ingredients In This Recipe
Ingredient Notes
- Dates: Medjool dates are needed for this recipe. 24 dates equals about 500 grams or 1 pound. Medjool dates are sweet, plump and juicy and have an almost caramel like flavour when baked.
- Spelt Flour: I used wholemeal spelt flour, and white spelt flour would work equally well. Alternatively, you could use plain flour or all purpose flour.
- Eggs: Use good quality size medium or large eggs at room temperature
- Apples: I used granny smith apples. Any tart crisp apple would work. Best not to use an apple that is too sweet as the dates provide a good amount of sweetness.
- Bicarb Soda: this helps the pudding to rise, however it works best when used with another leavening agent like Baking Powder.
- Baking Powder: This also helps the pudding to rise and to give it its lightness.
- Ground Cinnamon: For the ultimate pudding feel. Alternative, you could substitute with mixed spice, or ground ginger.
How To Make
- Preheat Oven. Heat oven 180 degrees C for fan oven, 200 degrees C for regular oven. 350 degrees Farenheit for fan oven/400 degrees Farenheit for regular oven.
- Prepare Dates & Apples. Remove seeds from dates, peel the apples and chop into chunks roughly 1cm or ½ inch.
- Heat & Soften Dates. Place the deseeded dates and chopped apple into a large pot, along with 2 cups of water. Heat on high and bring to the boil, stirring occasionally. Once boiling, keep on the heat for 3 minutes, then remove from heat.
- Add Butter. Add the butter and stir in until it is melted.
- Add Bicarb Soda. Stir the bicarb soda into the dates. It will froth up and become a little more creamier. Set aside.
- Add Other Ingredients to Food Processor. Add the flour, baking powder, ground cinnamon, eggs, and vanilla into an 8 cup food processor and blitz for 30 to 60 seconds or until combined.
- Add Date Mixture to Food Processor. Pour foamy date mixture into food processor and blitz for a further 30 to 60 seconds or until all combined.
- Prepare Tin & Pour in Batter. Line a 9 inch round springform tin with baking paper on the bottom, and grease the sides of the tin with butter. Pour the batter to the tin.
- Bake. Bake for 50 minutes. As this is a sticky date pudding, when you insert a cake skewer into the centre it may not come out entirely clean. This is OK. Cover with a clean towel and let cool completely. Once cooled, store in an air tight container in the fridge for 24 hours before eating.
Recipe Tips
- Food Processor: I have an 8 cup food processor which was a good size for this recipe.
- Dates: Don't forget to remove the seeds from the dates before getting started. Alternatively you can buy medjool dates already with the seeds removed. Make sure they're at room temperature so they are soft. This way they'll cook quicker and be easier for your food processor to blitz.
- Individual Servings: Instead of making a big cake, make 12 regular muffin sized cakes. I prefer to use silicone non stick muffin trays as its really easy to get them out. If doing muffin size, you should reduce the cooking time to approximately half.
How to Serve
My favourite way to eat healthy sticky date pudding is with custard, sugar free of course. There's nothing more comforting than a warm sticky cake with cold thick and creamy custard.
I love date desserts for their rich full flavour, yet without all the over processed white and brown sugars you'd normally find in a typical winter style comfort food sticky date pudding.
Variations
- Make it into a nutty sticky date slice by using a square or rectangle baking tray. Just make sure to line with baking paper. Top with walnuts or pistachios, and a sprinkle of sea salt.
- Turn it into a blueberry sticky date cake by adding a combination of dried organic blueberries and fresh blueberries. It takes the humble sticky date pud to a whole new dimension, not to mention it's boost in anti oxidant factor!
- Add some real chocolate chunks (sugar free or dark chocolate) to the batter before baking, and then once it's in the tin, poke a few extra chocolate bits into the top. Then you have a Chocolate Sticky Date Pudding. This creates a decadantly rich gooey dessert, that's still on the healthy side but is just a bit more dressed up.
Your Questions
How Long Does Sticky Date Pudding Last?
Sticky Date Pudding will generally keep in the fridge for upto 3 days, and in the freezer for upto 8 weeks. I never have to worry about this though because it just doesn't last that long in our household!
How To Reheat Sticky Date Pudding?
For a single serve of sticky date pudding that has been in the fridge, reheat, covered, in the microwave for 30 to 60 seconds, depending on how warm you like it. To reheat a frozen sticky date pudding, either let it defrost naturally to room temperature, then reheat it in the microwave, or defrost from frozen by using the defrost settings on your microwave.
More Dessert and Pudding Recipes
- Healthy Self Saucing Chocolate Pudding for Two
- Sugar Free Apple Crumble (One of my most popular recipes!)
- Microwave Chocolate Pudding In A Mug (for one or two if you want to share)
- Sugar Free Chocolate Orange Cheesecake
- Healthy Stewed Apples
Healthy Sticky Date Pudding
Kim Morris
A healthy, light and airy Sticky Date Pudding that stays moist for days.
Ingredients
- 24 medjool dates (pitted) - [Note 1]
- 2 cups tap water
- 1 cup + ⅓ cup Spelt Flour - [Note 2]
- 1 cup unsalted butter
- 4 medium eggs
- 2 medium apples - [Note 3]
- 2 teaspoons bicarb soda
- 4 teaspoons baking powder
- 2 teaspoon vanilla essence
- 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
Instructions
- Heat oven 180 degrees C for fan oven, 200 degrees C for regular oven. 350 degrees Farenheit for fan oven/400 degrees Farenheit for regular oven.
- Remove seeds from 24 medjool dates (pitted), peel 2 medium apples and chop into chunks roughly 1cm or ½ inch.
- Place the deseeded dates and chopped apple into a large pot, along with 2 cups tap water. Heat on high and bring to the boil, stirring occasionally. Once boiling, keep on the heat for 3 minutes, then remove from heat.
- Add 1 cup unsalted butter and stir in until it is melted.
- Add 2 teaspoons bicarb soda to the pot and stir in. It will froth up and become a little more creamier. Set aside.
- Add 1 cup + ⅓ cup Spelt Flour, 4 teaspoons baking powder, 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon, 4 medium eggs, and 2 teaspoon vanilla essence into an 8 cup food processor and blitz for 30 to 60 seconds or until combined.
- Pour foamy date mixture into food processor and blitz for a further 30 to 60 seconds or until all combined.
- Line a 9 inch round springform tin with baking paper on the bottom, and grease the sides of the tin with butter. Pour the batter into the tin, smoothing out the top if needed.
- Bake for 50 minutes. As this is a sticky date cake, when you insert a cake skewer into the centre it may not come out entirely clean. This is OK, its meant to be a little sticky. Cover with a clean towel and let cool completely. Once cooled, store in an air tight container in the fridge for 24 hours before eating.
Notes
- Dates: Medjool dates are needed for this recipe. 24 dates equals about 500 grams or 1 pound. Medjool dates are sweet, plump and juicy and have an almost caramel like flavour when baked.
- Spelt Flour: I used wholemeal spelt flour, and white spelt flour would work equally well. Alternatively, you could use plain flour or all purpose flour.
- Apples: I used granny smith apples. Any tart crisp apple would work. Best not to use an apple that is too sweet as the dates provide a good amount of sweetness.
- Bicarb Soda: this helps the cake to rise, however it works best when used with another leavening agent like Baking Powder.
- How to Eat: I find this cake is at its best when you make it a day ahead after its had a day or overnight in the fridge so all those dates can work their magic to create a sticky dense (but incredibly light) pudding.
- Serving: This is a cake that needs to be eaten with either custard, thick cream or ice cream.
- Storage: Store in the fridge in an air tight container and eat within 4 to 5 days
- Freezing: Cake can be frozen for upto 6 weeks. To defrost, let it come to room temperature naturally.
Nutrition
Calories: 264kcalCarbohydrates: 29gProtein: 3gFat: 16gSaturated Fat: 10gFiber: 3gSugar: 19g
Note: Sugars contained in this recipe are from naturally occurring sugars in fruits, vegetables or other natural sweeteners. Calories have been calculated for your convenience using My Fitness Pal and are based on the ingredients listed in the recipe card.
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Sondi says
Do you think deglet dates would work in place of medjool dates here? Perhaps if you soaked them first or something?
Kim says
I think the Deglet dates would be less sweet and you may have to add a little additional sweetener like granulated monkfruit. As they have a tougher outer skin, definitely soaking them first, or microwaving them to soften would be a good idea.
Sally says
This is excellent - I made a 1/2 size version as a tester before a full quantity for a family gathering where it got double thumbs up from everyone. I used GF flour, 20 dates (we're a family who tends not to need too much sweetness) and cooked it in a square cake tin fully lined. I like a bit of 'texture' so didn't fully blitz the mix to smooth. For the full size cake, perhaps checking at 45 minutes would have been more appropriate - but that may have been due to the GF flour. It is a very liquid mix.
Alison says
You have two apples in recipe but only peel and chop 1 - what happens to the other. I cannot see it mentioned anywhere.
Kim says
Hi Alison, Sorry that was an oversight. Its peel and chop both apples. Originally I had one apple going into the pudding and the other apple sliced on top. However I recently made over the original recipe and decided that it was better with both apples in the pudding. Recipe has been updated accordingly. Sorry for the confusion.
Carina says
Hey, I noticed that you just updated this recipe. I prefer to still do it with 2 eggs or one banana instead. And you need to check the water measurements, in the top it says 2 cups but you’re only using one within the description.
Did I mention this is my favorite cake? Thank you so much for publishing this.
Warm regards,
Carina
Kim says
Thanks for the pickup. Updated to two cups of water.
Lorraine Irvine says
Sounds really good. What do you pour over the top and do you have A butter scotch or caramel recipe for this?
Kim says
Hi Lorraine, I like to have this with custard, which I have a recipe for here
. Unfortunately I don't yet have a recipe for butterscotch or caramel.