Dreamy Date Caramel

This Date Caramel is silky, sweet, rich, creamy and dreamy! It’s made with only 6 plant based ingredients and can be ready to devour minutes. It’s multifunction capabilities with just a little tweaks means you can use it on or over anything!

I’m sure you’ve come across or at least have heard of date caramel. Dates have blown up because of it’s caramel-y sweetness and multi-purpose functions. It can be eaten on it’s own, used in so many kinds of recipes as a fruit based sweetener… it’s definitely a pantry staple in my kitchen. I’ve tried so many date caramel recipes, and while yes it does taste sweet I find it’s missing that creamy rich element. I’ve tried a couple variations of date caramel where I’ve used ONLY coconut based ingredients or ONLY nut butter based ingredients but they both were too strong in that one flavour that over powered the natural date caramel flavour. Don’t get me wrong, they both are still delicious but not the caramel I remember eating on my sundaes and waffles.

If I count the first time I tried to “fix up” a date caramel, I’ve tested this recipe for around 4 years now! I’ve never shared the date caramel (that’s always in my fridge) just because I didn’t think it was special or any different from a lot of the others I’ve come across already. It tasted like what it was: dates + coconut or dates + nut butter. Meh. But you guys. Last Saturday, I don’t know what I did or what sparked me to do this but I combined left over ingredients of things I had in the fridge that needed to be used up and this magical creation was born! Let’s run through these ingredients that make up this dreamy date caramel.

• Dates – obviously. You want to use good quality dates for good quality caramel. Soft, sweet and caramel-y.

• Cashew butter – Cashew butter has the MOST neutral flavour so I highly recommend using cashew butter. I used left over scrap cashew butter when this dream caramel was born, it looked a lot more “creamy” without the little almond skins… but there wasn’t a lot of caramel to take photos of. In these photos, I made it with almond butter because I know, cashew butter is hard to get your hands on and I wanted this recipe to be “everyday & practical”. It’s still delicious, I promise :).

• Coconut Cream – From a can! The good stuff that rises to the top when you place it in the fridge.

• Creamed coconut – I’ve been playing around with this stuff so much lately, I find it to be a cross between coconut oil and coconut butter. It’s unsweetened dehydrated fresh pulp of a mature coconut, creamed into a paste. You can find it in the international section of most stores (found in a box). If you can’t find it, coconut butter will work, but you might find a bit of grit, especially if it’s home made.

• Molasses – It enriches the deep caramel flavour.

• Vanilla – also enhances the flavour.

• Salt – just a dash!

This date caramel will be your new go-to + pantry staple condiment because it’s so multi-purpose! You can change up the consistency by adjusting the ingredients a tad bit depending on what you’re going for. I use it over my Japanese sweet potatoes, in yogurt, oatmeal, toast, sandwiches, bananas, apples…. okay like everything. It’s made with only 6 plant based ingredients so give this a whirl!!

I hope you try and love this date caramel as much as I do! It’s:

• silky smooth

• creamy

• rich

• drizzle-able

• spreadable

• spoonful-able (aka you can eat it by the spoonful ;))

• made with healthy plant based ingredients

• and incredibly delicious… on like everything!

Tips and Tricks to making Dreamy Date Caramel

• I highly recommend using soft, gooey dates. My favourite are: bahri and dayri- but you can also use your typical medjool.

• *coconut cream is from a full fat can of coconut milk that has been stored in the fridge, with only the cream scooped out

• creamed coconut usually comes in a sealed pouch, if you can’t get your hands on this coconut butter will work too

• cashew butter will yield the most “caramel-y” flavour as other nut butter take over the natural caramel-y date flavours- however almond butter works well too (photos taken with almond butter variation).

• VARIATIONS:

  • For drizzle-able thinner sauce: add an additional 1-2 tbsp of maple syrup (or water- but you won’t get that “drizzle” look as much)

  • For a thicker texture – add 2-4 more dates OR coconut butter

  • To use as a spread, add an additional 2 tbsp of nut butter

If you recreate this Dreamy Date Caramel please share it and let me know what you think by tagging me on Instagram @lisakitahara, I love seeing all of your tasty recreations!