Recipe for a simple pumpkin date cake – that is perfect for tea time
Since Christmas, actually since December, I’ve been on a baking spree and the reason is a certain person – a young woman who is here to take care of my son for some hours each day – it has freed some hours to do the things I like or to do just nothing – which was completely impossible for the last one year since Atri was born. So I’m back to baking for the few friends I have here, for my wonderful neighbouring aunty-uncle and for my little one of course. He is quite the foodie and shows sincere appreciation for everything his mom cooks up. After devouring a carrot-banana cake on his first birthday, he quite liked it that he got a new cake to eat on his 13th month birthday. The rum-soaked Christmas cakes I baked was out of bounds for him as I didn’t want him getting hooked on to Old Monk this early in life – although some of my relatives and friends think otherwise.
He has been eating pumpkin puree since he started on weaning foods six months ago, hence the familiar taste of pumpkin in this cake along with iron-rich dates that play the role of natural sweetener, replacing most of the sugar in this pumpkin date cake. Hope you and your little ones enjoy this.
If you love tea cakes, also check out my favourite Slam Bang Coffee Cake!
You’ll also love this BEST Banana Bread with Oat flour
How about this super moist eggless apple cake with a secret technique that keeps it soft as ever!
Love pumpkins? Are pumpkins in season now in your part of the world? Check out my best pumpkin recipes for sweet, savoury dishes, and curries too!
| Cook Time | 60 minutes |
| Servings |
serving
|
- 2 cups yellow pumpkin cubes
- 10 dates soaked in water overnight
- 1/4 cup vegetable oil
- 1/3 cup brown sugar
- 2 tbsps yogurt
- 1 tbsp vinegar
- 1/4 cup milk
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 1.5 cups plain flour (or 1 cup plain flour & 1/2 cups whole wheat flour)
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp baking soda
- 1 tsp cinnamon powder
- 1 tsp ginger powder
Ingredients
Sift the following together:
|
|
- Pressure cook the pumpkin cubes with the soaked dates with 1/4 cup water. Squeeze out the seeds from the cooked dates (if using dates with seeds). In a mixer jar, puree the pumpkin and dates. You'll get roughly 1 cup of thick puree.
- Preheat the oven at 180 Celsius.
- Mix the pumpkin date puree, oil, sugar, vinegar, yogurt, milk and vanilla extract in a bowl. Whisk well with a hand whisk or electric whisk until you get a smooth mixture.
- Gently mix the sifted dry ingredients into the wet mixture. Pour into a well oiled 8" square tin, or line a muffin tin with paper cups and fill up to 3/4th (makes 12 muffins).
- Bake at 180 Celsius until a tester comes clean; 30-40 minutes for cake and around 16-20 minutes for muffins.
Note:
Optional : Some chopped dried fruits or nuts, I used some chopped dried fruits soaked in juice (1/4 cup)
Cool on a rack and cut into slices. Serve with coffee or tea. Great when served for a kiddies' party too.
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That is an interesting Combo in a cake. Atri is sure being trained for gastronomic delites.
Looks yummy and healthy too ! A must try for me.
Healthy start for a new year…some diffrent combination as well…got to try…
So you’re in Hyderabad now. Arundati told me you’d be moving.I’m yet to bake with pumpkin.Happy New Year to you and family.
Cakes looks yumm Nandita!
This looks so healthy and delicious. That’s a good idea to use a mix of pumpkin and dates. I never have dates on hand, but I wonder if it’s possible to use pureed raisins instead of dates. The recipe sounds easy and healthy. Thanks for posting!(By the way, I like the new layout)
Nice. Why does this look more like the carrot raisin cake? I can see carrots and raisins in this one 🙂
Just happen to discover this, looks great and surely I gonna try it! Thanks!
Hi, you add the raw pumpkin cubes as they are in the cake batter? The pumpkin doesn’t need to be cooked and pureed before baking?
Thanks for bringing this to my notice, some recipe instructions got scrambled when I moved to wordpress – in the original recipe the entire pureeing process was in brackets that got omitted. Have rewritten the recipe now. Hope this helps 🙂