I posted a variation of this a year or so ago, but it is so delicious I think it’s worth reposting. It’s a very flexible recipe, you can use any combination of dried fruit and nuts that you like – or whatever you have an opened packet of in the pantry. If you don’t have nut roll cake tins it could be made in a normal shaped cake tin, but somehow I’m not convinced that it would taste quite as delicious. If you’re going the nut roll tin path I do suggest you buy two tins – the recipe fills two, and as they take 50 minutes to cook you want to have them in the oven a the same time.
Ingredients
250 mls boiling water
70 grams butter
200 grams dried dates, finely chopped
½ teaspoon bicarbonate soda
1 cup / 220 grams brown sugar
2 cups (300 grams) self raising flour, plus a little bit more, maybe a few tablespoons
¾ cup chopped walnuts
1 egg
Method
- Grease two nut roll tins and line the bottoms and sides with baking paper. Remove all but the bottom oven tray – the cake tins are pretty tall, it’s worth checking how they best fit in your oven before they are filled. Heat the oven to 180 degrees C.
- Place the water and butter in a large saucepan and heat until the butter melts.
- Remove form the heat and stir in the carb soda. Mix well, then add the rest of the ingredients.
- Spoon the mixture into the prepared tins. The mix should half fill each tin. Place the tins, standing up, in the oven and bake for about 50 minutes.
- Remove form the oven and leave to stand for at least 10 minutes, as the cakes are pretty fragile when hot – I’ve been known to break a few when trying to remove them too hastily.
- Serve with butter. Lots of butter.
