Food for the gods recipe

Food for the gods! It's one of those treats we can bake this Christmas for giving to our family and friends. I am sure this will leave them impressed, but it's actually as easy as making those sinful fudge brownies. Recipe courtesy of The Maya Kitchen.


Ingredients:

200 grams pitted dates
200 grams walnuts
1-1/4 cups butter, softened to room temperature
5 cups lightly (not loosely) packed dark brown sugar
3-3/4 cups + 1 tablespoon MAYA All-Purpose Flour
5 teaspoons baking powder
2-1/2 teaspoons salt
5 eggs
2-1/2 teaspoons vanilla essence


Procedure:

Preheat the oven to 350°F/ 177°C. Place the pitted dates on a chopping board and sprinkle with one tablespoonful of flour.3 Chop coarsely. Transfer the chopped dates to a bowl and set aside.
Chop the walnuts to roughly the same size as the chopped sultanas. Add to the dates in the bowl. In a mixing bowl, stir together the flour, baking powder and salt.
In a large mixing bowl, beat the butter and sugar until smooth. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Stir in the vanilla essence. Add the flour in batches, mixing with a wooden spoon. The batter will be very heavy. Finally, stir in the dates and walnuts. Cover the bottom and sides of a 12-1/2 x 17-1/2 x 1 jelly roll pan with non-stick baking paper. Allowing overhangs on the long sides is useful so that you slide off the baked food for the gods on a cooling rack in one piece.
Pour the batter into the pan scraping the sides and bottom of the mixing bowl to make sure you get all of the batter into the pan. Level off with a spatula. Bake in a preheated 350oF oven for 30 to 35 minutes or until a toothpick inserted at the center comes out clean. DO NOT OVERBAKE. Watch the last few minutes closely so that just as soon as it’s sufficiently baked, you can turn off the oven at once and take out the pan.
Then, cool in the pan for 10 minutes to firm it up a bit. Holding one end of the baking paper overhang with one hand and holding the pan at a 45o angle with the other, pull out the baked food for the gods and slide onto a cooling rack. Cool for another 15 minutes or so. While still a bit warm, cut into 1-1/2 or 2-inch squares. Cool completely. Place on festive colored paper cups or wrap in colored Japanese paper.