Date-Pine Nut Cake with Fennel

As always, I find Mahanandi
a beautiful blog to visit. I was recently struck by this recipe, for a Date-Walnut cake. Firstly, when I went to make it I realized that I did not have any walnuts, then I played around with the flavorings but overall the results were really good and frankly this was quite wholesome for a cake.

Date-PineNut Cake with Fennel

Makes one loaf

Ingredients

1 cup wholewheat flour

1 cup all-purpose flour

3/4 tsp baking soda

3/4 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp fennel seeds

1/2 tsp pumpkin pie spice

1 cup pinenuts

1 cup chopped dates

1/2 cup honey

1/2 cup dark brown sugar

1/4 cup soft butter

1 egg

1 cup buttermilk

Method of Preparation

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Grease a loaf pan and set aside.

2. Mix the flours, baking soda, baking powder, fennel seeds, pumpkin pie spice in a large bowl.

3. Stir in the pinenuts.

4. Mix the dates in the honey.

5. Beat the sugar, butter and egg till smooth.

6. Add in the dates with the honey.

7. Add to the dry ingredients in batches with the buttermilk. Blend till smooth.

8. Pour into a pan and cook for 45 minutes till well browned. Serve hot with tea.

Interestingly enough, I made this rather late at night and was not sure about having tea at that time. Someone had sent me a gift of something called white tea that I had never had before. This happens to be a rather mild tea that needs to be steeped in hot but not boiling water. It is also much lower in caffiene than regular black tea so it makes a good late evening drink when you are craving tea at night.