Tag: walnuts

Cakes & Bakes: Date and walnut loaf

Home-made date and walnut loaf | H is for Home

This date and walnut loaf is outstanding as an afternoon tea cake. It’s like a cross between malt loaf, a Yorkshire tea loaf and sticky toffee pudding.

Date and walnut loaf tins | H is for Home

Justin can never get enough of teatime loaf cakes, so this was made with him in mind.

Date and walnut loaf tins | H is for Home

So, if you’ve got a packet of dates lurking at the back of your food cupboard (perhaps from Christmas) this is the perfect way to use them all up.

Click here to save the recipe to Pinterest for later!

Home-made date and walnut loaf | H is for Home #recipe
Date and walnut loaf
Yields 2
Cook Time
1 hr
Cook Time
1 hr
Ingredients
  1. 450g/1lb stoned dates
  2. 1½tsp bicarbonate of soda
  3. 280ml/½pt boiling water or black tea
  4. 60g/2oz butter, softened
  5. 300g/12oz demerara sugar
  6. 2tbsp black treacle
  7. 2 eggs, lightly beaten
  8. 450g/1lb plain flour
  9. pinch of salt
  10. 60g/2oz chopped walnutsHome-made date and walnut loaf ingredients
Add ingredients to shopping list
If you don’t have Buy Me a Pie! app installed you’ll see the list with ingredients right after downloading it
Instructions
  1. Preheat the oven to 180ºC/350ºF/Gas mark 4
  2. Line two loaf tins with parchment paper
  3. Mix the bicarbonate of soda into the boiling water/black tea and pour over the dates making sure they're all covered. Leave until it goes cold
  4. Beat together the butter and sugar
  5. Add the beaten eggs
  6. Gradually add the flour, salt and chopped nuts
  7. Add the dates and the liquid they were soaking in. Combine thoroughly
  8. Divide the mixture between the two lined loaf tins
  9. Bake in the middle of the oven for an hour. Check on them after 45 minutes to make sure that their tops aren't cooking too quickly. If they start appearing too brown, cover the tops over with tin foil for the final 15 minutes cooking time
  10. Allow to cool on a wire rack
  11. To eat, slice and spread with butter
Print
Adapted from Yorkshire W. I. Recipe book
Adapted from Yorkshire W. I. Recipe book
H is for Home Harbinger https://hisforhomeblog.com/

Cakes & Bakes: Walnut Scotchies

'Cakes & Bakes' blog post banner

Home-made walnut scotchies slice | H is for Home #recipe #scotchie #scotchies

I was browsing a bookshelf in Picture House Antiques last week and my eyes fell upon a book that I just had to have. It’s the Yorkshire W.I. Recipe Book published in the late 1950s.

vintage Yorkshire W.I. recipe book from the late 1950s

According to the foreword by Chairman, Eileen Yewdall:

The present edition now being sold out, the Federation has been asked for another reprint, so a small committee has amended and added to the original, now including subjects that have come into favour since 1957, such as Deep Freeze, Cooking with Wine, Yeast Cookery, etc., etc.

page from a vintage Yorkshire W.I. recipe book from the late 1950s

It contains scores of recipes submitted by Yorkshire Women’s Institute members with, rather tellingly of the era, many oven temperatures given in Regulo and seven separate recipes for salad cream!

The first recipe I’ve attempted is one for walnut scotchies, which was provided by the W.I. in Glasshouses. It’s a cake I’d never heard of previously – a sort of shortbread base with a meringue topping… and very tasty!

There are quite a few recipes in the book that I’d not heard of before – far less tasted. I’ll be testing out lots of them in the near future and sharing the results here with you.

Walnut Scotchies

Print recipe Pin recipe
Cook Time 30 minutes
Total Time 30 minutes

Ingredients
  

  • 110 g/4oz butter
  • 170 g/6oz caster sugar
  • 2 egg yolks & 2 egg whites
  • 170 g/6oz flour
  • 1 tsp baking powder
  • pinch of salt
  • ½ tsp vanilla essence
  • 60 g/2oz chopped walnuts
  • 110 g/4oz brown sugar

Instructions
 

  • Beat butter and sugar to a cream
  • Stir in egg yolks one at a time and then add the flour sifted with baking powder and pinch of salt
  • Add vanilla essence and mix well
  • Spread ½cm/¼inch thick on well-greased oblong tin about 25cm/10inch x 22cm/9inch
  • Sprinkle with chopped walnuts
  • Beat the 2 egg whites until stiff
  • Lightly mix in brown sugar and spread over the nuts
  • Bake for half an hour in a moderate oven (180°C/350°F/Gas mark 4)
  • Leave till cold and cut into squares