laurasaur

Will stick up the other pics tonight

Well my husband came home slightly intoxicated tonight. First question: Do we have any more pie? Me: haha no you ate it all last night. Hubby: (standing in front of fridge) I’m going to make sticky date pudding!! Me: (staring in disbelief) um, okay? Do you want me to make you something? Hubby: (guilty look) Yes please baby!!

Haha OK that is a slightly shortened version but he is really cute. And a huge fan of toothsome desserts with fruit. So we didn’t have very many dates, and I hugely improvised this recipe with amazing success

Pudding:
100g dried dates (pitted)
150g sultanas – you can vary the quantities of the sultanas/dates as long as they add up to 250g.
1 tsp baking soda
250ml/1 cup water

125g butter at room temp
1 cup brown sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 eggs
1 3/4 cups flour

Coconut Caramel Sauce:
1/2 cup sugar
1/4 cup water
1 cup coconut cream

Preheat oven to 180 degrees Celsius. Place dates, raisin and baking soda into a bowl. Pour over boiling water. Using an electric mixer, beat butter, sugar and vanilla until pale and creamy. Add eggs, 1 at a time, beating well after each addition. Fold through date mixture and flour until just combined.

Spoon mixture into casserole dish or cake pan. Bake for 30 to 40 minutes or until a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean. Pierce holes in top with a skewer and then pour some of the syrup over the top.

To make the sauce: place sugar and water in a heavy based saucepan. Heat over medium heat until dissolved, stirring often with a wooden spoon. Once all the sugar is dissolved, stop stirring and heat until mixture turns golden brown. This will take about 8 minutes, but I looked away and mine burnt slightly.

Once it is brown, pour in coconut cream. It will bubble and sizzle like crazy but stir it anyway for about 3 minutes until all incorporated and thickened. Remove from heat and store leftovers in a jar in the fridge.

Pâte Sucrée is delicious and so easy to make yourself, you will never buy it ready made again.

The only thing you need to respect is to not overwork the dough.

This recipe is not as traditional as I did not have the full measure of almonds, so I added the finely sliced zest of one lemon to make up some of the difference, and the taste comes through very strongly.

300g salted butter, at room temperature
190g icing sugar
30g ground almonds
seeds from 1 vanilla bean
2 eggs
500g plain flour
finely chopped zest 1 lemon

Assemble all ingredients before starting.

Beat butter until soft and creamy in KA or by hand.

Add icing sugar, ground almonds, lemon zest and vanilla seeds. Beat until combined.

Add eggs one at a time, beating between each one until fully incorporated.

Remove from mixer if using and add all of the flour. Gently combine until dough is just crumbly but just holds together, do not overwork or it will be tough and chewy instead of flaky and crispy.

Divide into 3 balls, flatten gently and wrap tightly in gladwrap. Chill for 2 hours before using.

The dough can now be stored in the fridge for 2 days, or in the freezer for a month (Defrost fully in fridge before using).

I have refridgerated most of this, but I had to make a special treat for hubby.. a quick messy freeform strawberry pie which by all accounts was delicious!