SPICED OATS COCONUT DATES CAKE

CAKES ARE REGULAR IN THE FAMILY SINCE MY CHILDHOOD!

Not only homemade cakes are a regular affair in the family; store bought cakes too keep coming. Since my childhood, I have seen cakes coming regular to our home, not alone during birthday celebrations, X-Mas and New Year, but round the year. I think, because CAKE was favourite to my parents; they got me a basic cake oven once I passed 10th Boards. I keep mentioning about this particular gift from my parents; I felt very blessed getting it; I loved it that they enjoyed my simply made BASIC CAKES. I remember, all of us in our home, may be a few neighbourhood kids would sit around and watch with excitement the entire process of cake making. People were easy going then, did not come with much baggages; even I do not remain what I used to be! Amazingly, I also made tea stall like biscuit cookies then with semolina & flour, totally forgot how I did; that taste I remember. After marriage, baking did not happen for few years; I again started it all after relocating to this island.

FOOD IS AN IMPORTANT ELEMENT IN OUR FAMILIES; FOR GENERATIONS, I GUESS!

When it comes to food; I would specifically speak of our mother because it was  her fascination towards watching different cookery shows that prompted her to prepare a lot of different dishes for us. If she loved to cook, I loved to eat. After my marriage, she got very limited with her cooking experiments. It was me who enjoyed a variety of food; the father mostly love BENGALI FOOD, whilst the brother was not a food enthusiast. Today, he likes food but his choice is very limited. Same has happened at this home. It has been the son's growing up period, I used to cook a lot and he ate them in turns. Today, he is sitting so far in another country, the heart shrinks in pain on such special days more. I know he would eat way better cakes than his mumma made SPICED OATS COCONUT DATES CAKE; yet I imagine him sitting in his room and eating the major portions of the cake. The senior is so particular about his food intake that there is no thrill in cooking for him, a little excess of dishes may go to the refrigerator and get stale.

ABOUT THIS VEGETARIAN, GLUTEN-FREE SPICED OATS COCONUT DATES CAKE!

Its been long I do not try to make perfect looking cakes, I enjoy experimenting with the available INGREDIENTS FOR A POSSIBLE CAKE in my KITCHEN. I am telling you, there is an immense joy in mixing and matching different ingredients to get an UNCONVENTIONAL CAKE. I know there is no excuse not to have been able to grasp the knowledge of BAKING good conventional cakes till date but I hardly have the patience to learn. As I always say, I blog about the cakes that turn decent in my CONVECTION MODE MICROWAVE OVEN. About this particular cake, you will see later in the post that I had used very few HEALTHY ingredients doing it; like fresh, shredded coconut, oat meal, dates, self made spice powder; everything of our choice. It may not look fluffier and regular but it tasted very well with out tea / coffee. I suggest you have this SPICED OATS COCONUT DATES CAKE fresh and warm. For a vegan version, I perhaps had to use soy curd instead of our plain doi / dahi, may we try using that next?

INGREDIENTS:

OATS : 1 COFFEE MUG

SHREDDED COCONUT : 1 MEDIUM SIZED TEA CUP

PLAIN YOGURT : 1 SMALL SIZED TEA CUP

OIL : 1/2 SMALL TEACUP

BROWN SUGAR : 5-6 TBSP

BAKING POWDER : 1 TSP

BAKING SODA : 1/4 TSP

DATES : A HANDFUL [DE-SEEDED, ROUGHLY TORN]

SHUGANDHI MOSHOLA MIX / AROMATIC SPICE POWDER : 2 TSP [CLICK THE TITLE HEAD FOR THE RECIPE]

PROCEDURE :

I have taken the oats flakes in a blender and got it powdered.

I had added baking powder & baking soda to it; mixed the entire thing together!

Thereafter, I added the shredded coconut and mixed together well.

I had taken the yogurt, oil, brown sugar in the blender and blended them together into a paste.

I had added the smooth paste to the oat meal mixture well, thereafter the homemade spice powder; mixing the entire thing well again.

I have taken the batter in an aluminium foiled cake tin and arranged the washed date pieces atop. 

Remember, this is oats flour and not refined flour or whole wheat flour; you need not worry because we are not expecting a regular looking cake here. But what you get is a yum, healthy deal.

Mine is a convection mode microwave oven. So I preheated the oven at 180*C for 10 minutes, placing the low height wired stool inside.

Thereafter, I had placed the cake tin atop the wired stool and baked it at 180*C for 25 to 30 minutes!

It looks like this and tasted wow.

I think the cake tasted the best when fresh & warm. We had it both ways, fresh & refrigerated; I insist we have it fresh.