Chocolate Date Walnut Cake with Salted Caramel Buttercream

I can’t believe how fast my half term holidays went by, now we have one more term to go and then its summer holidays! My studies are on its final few weeks and I (as usual) have kept all the assignments till the very end, so whenever I get time I am busy catching up with those works. Hopefully by July, I will be able to submit everything and will get some time to breath, enjoy some sunshine and of course do more blog posts!

It was our anniversary last week, 9 years to be precise! That morning was my day off and it was just like any other day. I was lazing around with no intention of cooking up anything special but then came a call in skype from lil sis with anniversary wishes. She wanted to know what am I baking and when she heard my reply “Nothing” she didn’t sound very pleased. She pointed out that I bake cake for everyone else and it’s not fair not to bake anything for our special day. Anyway that motivated me to whip up something special. A quick raid in the fridge and I knew what I wanted to make for main and starter. But when I checked for the cake ingredients, I was disappointed that I had only 125 gm of butter which wouldn’t be enough for cake and frosting. After brain storming a bit I decided to experiment my own recipe with the limited ingredients I had. It was inspired from my previous bakes of sticky toffee pudding and coffee walnut cake, so I came up with a new idea of chocolate dates walnut cake. It may sound boastful when I say it was one the best cake I baked in a long time but I have to stress that out again as it was absolutely delicious. The texture, moisture and the taste, a perfect bake indeed!! 

Ingredients ( serves 6-8)

Flour – 1 cup

Cocoa powder – 2 tbs

Salt – 1/4tsp

Baking powder – 1 /2 tsp

Eggs – 2 (large)

Oil – ½ cup

Vanilla extract – 1 tsp

Caster sugar – ½ cup

Light brown sugar – ½ cup

Dates (pitted) – 150 gm

Boiling water – 3/4 cup

Baking soda – 1/2 tsp

Walnuts (chopped ) – 25 gm

Method

• In a saucepan place 150 gm of dates and add boiling water to it. Cook for 1-2 minutes.
• Remove from fire and add baking soda to it. Blend it into a puree
• Sift flour, cocoa powder, salt, baking powder and keep it aside.
• In a bowl break 2 eggs, add both caster sugar and brown sugar to it and beat with an electric beater for 1-2 minutes.
• Add vanilla extract, oil and beat just to mix.
• Add the sifted dry ingredients and fold in.
• Add the dates puree and carefully fold in.
• Finally add the chopped walnuts and fold in.
• Pour the batter into two 6 inch greased cake tin and bake for 35-45 minutes or until a tooth pick inserted comes out clean.

 Ingredients for salted caramel (yields 2 -3 tbs. of salted caramel)

Butter – 25 gm

Light brown sugar – 25 gm

Double Cream -50 ml

Salt – 1/8 tsp

Method

Place light brown sugar, butter, salt and cream in a saucepan on a low heat until the sugar dissolves and the sauce thickens and gets a  toffee flavour.

Ingredients for salted caramel buttercream

Butter - 100 gm - (approximately 1/2 cup)

Icing sugar - 200 gm (1 1/2 cup )

Double cream - 50 ml

Meringue powder - 1tsp

Vanilla extract - 1tsp

Salted caramel – 2 tbs.

Method

·        In a mixing bowl add 1/3 of the sugar, salt and meringue powder and mix.

·        Add cream to it and beat it for 5 minutes in an electric mixer with paddle attachment.

·        Add remaining sugar and beat for 3 minutes.

·        Add Butter little by little and beat for 5-7 minutes.

·        Add vanilla extract, salted caramel and beat for 1 minute.

Assembling the cake

Place one layer of 6 inch cake on cake stand and spread buttercream on top. Place the second layer and cover the whole cake with the rest of the buttercream.

Anniversary dinner !! Chicken Pilaf, Jerk chicken and Cake