Date cake

بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم

This is our family (forever) favourite cake recipe. You just have to become addicted to it, as long as you love dates.

Ingredients:

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

200 gram butter, room temperature

1/2 cup brown sugar, firmly packed

4 medium eggs, room temperature

1 cup dates, chopped and pitted (I use dates that are sold ready for baking)

3 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda

1/2 cup milk

1 tsp vanilla

1/2 cup almond, peeled and chopped

1/2 cup walnut, chopped

Method;

• if the dates you are using are dry, chop them and soak them in the milk with 1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda for an hour, other wise move to the next step
• preheat oven 175 degrees Celsius, combine (sieve) flour, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda and set aside
• with an electric mixer, beat sugar and butter till light and fluffy, add eggs one by one while continuing beating,
• add vanilla, milk and dates, beat till well combined
• add nuts
• add flour mixture and beat for two minutes, then mix using a spoon
• bake for 40-45 minutes

for other variety:

*add or remove nuts

*use white sugar instead of brown

*add raisins

 *add chocolate chips

Date cookies

بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم

These are the kind of cookies we serve for guests, or finish them off ourselves. We have them with Arabic coffee , but you can enjoy them with a glass of milk as well :). While I watch the tv, I remove date seeds, eat the date, or make a cake, or these cookies . In this way the task doesn't become really boring.

the date ball

Ingredients (slightly adapted from here) :

1-1 1/2 cup date (depends how much date you want in your cookies)

1 tsp cinnamon powder

200 gram salted butter

2 eggs

1 tsp vanilla

3 cups all-purpose flour

1/2 or 3/4 cup caster sugar

• Mix the date with Cinnamon powder and set aside
• Beat butter and sugar till light and fluffy
• Add eggs, one at a time, add vanilla
• Add flour, mix till combined
• roll small part of the dough using a rolling pin, add some rolled date, close it and cut, emm I can't explain it, but hope the photos are able to.

• bake in oven set to 175 degrees Celsius for ten minutes
• keep in tight container