MEL MEOWS: Sticky Date Pudding with Butterscotch sauce

Had cravings for sticky date pudding after I ate one a few months back. Finally got down to business to make one. hehe. I think this is a great recipe during the Ramadan period where there is an abundance of dates. I think only select supermarkets carry dates during the other times of the year. I bought the Deri dates from the Fairprice Xtra at Changi Business Park for $4.99 for a box of 300g i think. There were other dates there that were pricier, and I believe might be nicer?
I'm not a date expert haha. someone enlighten me????

Recipe adapted from The Little Teochew

For the Sticky Date Pudding
- 270g (1 1/2 cups) deseeded dried dates (I used Deri dates because it was one of the cheaper ones hehe. Trying to save cost!)
- 312ml (1 1/4 cups) water
- 1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda (I substituted this with 3 teaspoons of baking powder)
- 60g (1/4 cup) butter, roughly chopped
- 2 large eggs
- 1 teaspoon (5ml) vanilla extract
- 188g (1 1/4 cups) self-raising flour (I substituted this with plain flour + slightly less than 2 teaspoons of baking powder, and 1/2 teaspoon of salt)
- 150g (2/3 cup, firmly packed) brown sugar (I reduced to 100g)

Spent a while deseeding these dates. So sticky hehe. Popped a bit into my mouth ^^

1. Place dates and water in a small saucepan over high heat. When the mixture starts to boil, add bicarbonate of soda and 60g butter, and remove from the heat. Stir and then set aside for 25 minutes (the butter will melt during this time).

2. Preheat oven to 180 degrees Celsius (160 degrees Celsius fan-forced). If you are not using a fan-forced oven, adjust the oven rack to the lower half of the oven so the top of the pudding will be in the centre of the oven.

3. Line a muffin tin with cupcake liners. Another alternative would be to grease a cake tin.

4. Use a potato masher to crush the dates directly in the saucepan

5. Add eggs and vanilla to date mixture and whisk until just combined.

6. Stir flour and 150g (2/3 cup, firmly packed) brown sugar together in a medium bowl. Use the back of the spoon to break up any lumps of brown sugar. Add date mixture to the flour mixture and gently fold the ingredients together until just combined.

Not the prettiest looking batter around!

7. Scoop batter into prepared muffin tins using the handy-dandy ice-cream scoop! If, when baking, the pudding starts to overbrown, loosely cover it with greaseproof paper/aluminium foil. For my case, it didn't brown!

8. Bake the pudding for about 50-60 minutes (about 20-30 minutes if baking in muffin tins), or until it springs back when lightly pressed in the centre. A thin-bladed knife or wooden skewer inserted into the centre of the pudding should come out without any batter attached.

For the Butterscotch Sauce
(adapted from Australian GoodFood Magazine, July 2010, and seen atmuffinsareuglycupcakes and Evan's Kitchen Ramblings

Make the sauce when the pudding is baking.
- 185ml whipping cream
- 165g firmly packed brown sugar (I would reduce the sugar if I made this again! A tad too sweet)
- 150g butter, chopped
- 1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
- Pinch of salt

1. Melt all the ingredients in a saucepan over medium heat. Stir constantly until mixture thickens. Make sure the sugar does not burn.

2. Leave to cool slightly.

When it's cooked!

Actually, this butterscotch sauce doesn't look gooey when heated. It only thickened slightly in my case. Hard to judge. Might look up better recipes for butterscotch! It tasted good though. :)

According to the Little Teochew, this step makes the pudding sticky:
When the pudding has finished baking, leave it in the pan and allow it to cool for 10 minutes on a wire rack. Using a skewer, pierce several deep holes in the pudding. Pour about 125ml (1/2 cup) of the hot butterscotch sauce over the pudding. Allow to stand for 5 minutes before removing from the pan.
* Note: As I used muffin tins, I removed each individual pudding after they had cooled down a little, but still warm to touch (about 15 minutes after baking). I then pricked them with a toothpick before spooning warm butterscotch sauce over. This helped the sauce penetrate into the pudding, making them extra moist and sticky.

Serve pudding with hot butterscotch sauce and even with vanilla ice-cream.