This super moist, delicate, and sweet vegan sticky toffee pudding tastes just like the classic and is undetectably dairy free and eggless! Topped with homemade dairy free toffee sauce and whipped cream, this is best vegan version of the classic British sticky date pudding, just in time for Christmas!

Amazing Vegan Sticky Toffee Pudding (Date Pudding)

What is sticky toffee pudding?

Sticky toffee pudding (or sticky date pudding, toffee pudding, or date pudding) is a delicious British dessert served around the holiday times for Christmas. It’s made with soaked dates that have been blended into a puree for a deliciously sweet and delicate cake that’s been layered and baked with a warm toffee sauce.

Traditionally, sticky date pudding is served with even more warm toffee sauce and a dollop of whipped cream or ice cream.

When sticky toffee pudding first came about, it was truly a delicacy that was only had on special occasions, as it used ingredients that were hard to come by and/or expensive. Sticky date pudding was made from start to finish in one day and well worth the time and effort!

Sticky toffee pudding, however, is quite different from figgy pudding and Christmas pudding, two other very classic British desserts!

Why you’ll love the vegan version of this classic British dessert:

If you love sticky toffee pudding, then you’re going to absolutely become obsessed with this vegan version. Jared and I recently moved, and our neighbors are from England. I brought over a few test rounds of the toffee pudding, and they said it tasted just like their grandmother’s (thank you to Lucy and Emma for being my wonderful and honest taste testers! 🙂 ).

That’s a win in my book!

This toffee pudding is unbelievably eggless, dairy free, and naturally vegan. You’d honestly never know! The cake is delicate yet structured, full of dates, and of course made extra sticky with the warm toffee sauce. It’s a very sweet cake, but honestly, you could sit eating it bite after bite, it’s so good.

Topped with extra toffee sauce and a dollop of vegan whipped cream, and you have yourself the perfect vegan Christmas dessert that everyone will love, vegan or not!

vegan toffee pudding

Vegan Sticky Toffee Pudding Ingredients

Here’s what you’ll need for making this easy vegan toffee pudding:

  • For the toffee sauce: You’ll need vegan butter, brown sugar, maple syrup, and coconut cream. I don’t recommend swapping out the coconut cream, as you really need a heavy cream-like liquid that just won’t work with a store bough lighter almond milk.
  • For the date puree: A crucial part to the sticky date pudding’s success is pureeing medjool dates with water. That’s it! I recommend organic Natural Delights dates- they’re always so soft and sweet. You can get the pitted or regular ones.
  • For the cake component: Aside from adding in the date puree, you’ll also need vegan butter, brown sugar, dairy free yogurt (an egg replacement), flour and leavening agents. That’s really it!

How to make vegan sticky toffee pudding (overview)

For the full written instructions and ingredient measurements, see the bottom of this post in the recipe card. You can also hit the “jump to recipe” button at the top of this post! Here, we’ll go over a brief overview of the steps, along with providing visuals for a better understanding of the recipe.

The entire process of making vegan toffee pudding should take just under 2 hours. These mini cakes are best served warm, so I don’t recommend making any component ahead of time. You want everything to be as fresh as possible!

You’ll first start by making the toffee sauce, followed by the date puree, and finally the cakes and assembly.

Time needed: 2 hours

Here’s how to make a secretly vegan toffee pudding:

  1. Prepare the toffee sauce first:

    If you’ve ever made caramel sauce, then it’s actually quite similar. You’ll cook this sauce with vegan butter, coconut cream, brown sugar, and maple syrup. Typically, you would use golden syrup in toffee sauce, but I’ve found that golden syrup is much harder to come by in the U.S., so I opted for maple syrup. The results were essentially identical! This part will take about 45 minutes start to finish.vegan toffee sauce

  2. Then make the date puree:

    As the toffee sauce is cooling (it will be HOT!), soak the dates in hot water, then puree everything together into a date puree. Then set this aside while you make the cake batter!

  3. Prepare the cake batter:

    This is simply creaming together the vegan butter and brown sugar, then adding in the remaining ingredients. Very similar to making any other cake or cupcake! You’ll add in the date puree, followed by the flour mixture, and mix everything together.vegan sticky toffee pudding batter

  4. The first round of baking:

    These cakes are actually baked in two stages: the first is to fully bake the cakes, then we’ll warm them again in the oven with the toffee sauce. Once you’ve baked the cakes the the muffin pan, remove them from the oven and invert the baked cakes onto a cooling rack.date pudding cakes before baking

  5. Divide the cakes in half.

    Use a serrated knife to slice each cake in half.sliced sticky toffee pudding cakes

  6. Then fill the muffin tin back up with layers of toffee sauce and cake!

    This will create the sticky toffee pudding effect! Spoon a little toffee sauce into each muffin tin, then place the top cake half on top, followed by more toffee sauce, and the final layers of cake. assembling the toffee pudding cakes

  7. Bake once more!

    Bake the sticky toffee puddings for about 5-10 minutes in the oven, just until they’re really melded together.

  8. Finally, serve your vegan sticky toffee puddings:

    Top each date pudding with more toffee sauce and a dollop of vegan whipped cream! I recommend using Forager Projects store bought coconut whipped cream- it’s amazing!sticky date pudding

Can sticky toffee pudding be made in advance?

This specific type of pudding is very difficult to make in advance while still maintaining the same desired textures and flavor. When you make this in advance, you risk the cakes drying out. The cakes should be very very moist! Or the toffee sauce not being as delicious and moveable as right when you made it. I would suggest allotting 2 hours to just prepare the sticky toffee pudding. It will be well worth it!

Can I make vegan toffee pudding without dates?

Unfortunately, dates is one of the main components of sticky date pudding. It won’t give you the best results to make it without dates and still achieve the desired taste and texture. Some people have used prunes instead of dates, but I personally believe it’s a very different flavor.

vegan date pudding

Can this sticky toffee pudding be made gluten free?

Absolutely, you can easily make this vegan toffee pudding gluten free as well by swapping out the flour for oat flour with a tablespoon of arrowroot starch or cornstarch. Adding this extra starch will help the oat flour resemble more of an all purpose flour texture. You can also use gluten free 1:1 baking flour, but I recommend the oat flour above all.

I’ve given the specific measurement swaps for the gluten free sticky toffee pudding in the recipe card notes section down below!

Toffee pudding tips & ticks

You can use ramekins, mini cake pans, or a large muffin tin.

I used a large muffin tin with 6 muffin cups. However, if you have enough ramekins, you can use those instead, or use 3″ or 4″ cake pans (of course, me being the cake baker that I am, I do have those as well! But I thought the muffin tin was more approachable!).

If you are not strictly vegan:

I personally am, but I know that some of my readers are not. If you’re vegetarian and don’t have a good vegan butter at your local store (and consume dairy), you can use regular cream and regular butter.

Be careful not to over bake the cakes!

Dry sticky toffee pudding cakes are not very fun. This cake batter is a very wet batter, and will take some time to bake, but the toothpick should be nearly clean when it comes out!

How to store leftovers:

If you have any leftover sticky toffee pudding cakes, you can store the cakes in an airtight container and in the fridge for up to 1 week or in the freezer for up to 2 months!

eaten vegan sticky toffee pudding

You’re just going to absolutely love this easy vegan sticky toffee pudding! It’s perfect for any Christmas celebration or even New Year’s Eve!

Want to save this recipe for later? Add it to your favorite recipe board on Pinterest!

Amazing Vegan Sticky Toffee Pudding (Date Pudding)

If you make this recipe, please be sure to leave a comment and a rating ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ below. This helps others to find the recipes! As always, I absolutely love to see your beautiful creations on Instagram and Pinterest, so be sure to tag me there as well!

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Amazing Vegan Sticky Toffee Pudding (Date Pudding)

Vegan Sticky Toffee Pudding (Date Pudding)

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  • Author: thebananadiaries
  • Prep Time: 30
  • Cook Time: 40
  • Total Time: 0 hours
  • Yield: 6 1x
  • Category: Dessert
  • Method: Baking
  • Cuisine: British
  • Diet: Vegan
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Description

This super moist, delicate, and sweet vegan sticky toffee pudding tastes just like the classic and is undetectably dairy free and eggless! Topped with homemade dairy free toffee sauce and whipped cream, this is best vegan version of the classic British sticky date pudding, just in time for Christmas!

Ingredients

Scale

Toffee Sauce:

  • 1 cup (240 mL) creamy coconut milk
  • 4 ounces vegan butter
  • 1 cup (165 grams) brown sugar
  • 1/2 cup (120 mL) maple syrup

Cake:

  • 6 ounces medjool pitted dates
  • 2/3 cup water, boiling
  • 1 cup flour
  • 1 tsp baking powder
  • 1/2 tsp baking soda
  • 3/4 cup brown sugar
  • 4 tbsp vegan butter, room temperature
  • 1/3 cup unsweetened vanilla dairy free yogurt, room temperature
  • 1 tsp vanilla extract

Instructions

  1. Please read through all instructions before beginning.You should plan for this to take you about 2 hours start to finish. You’ll first start by making the toffee sauce, then the date puree, and finally the cakes.
  2. Make the toffee sauce: Measure out all ingredients for the toffee sauce. In a medium sauce pan, add the coconut milk, vegan butter, brown sugar, and maple syrup. Turn the heat on to medium, and continue to stir the mixture until the butter has melted, about 3 minutes. Continue stirring with a silicone spatula or a whisk until the mixture starts to bubble. Then reduce the heat to medium-low, and cooke the toffee mixture for 40 minutes, or until thick. You should continue to stir the toffee every few minutes as it’s cooking. The toffee sauce should be amber in color and super thick. Remove from heat, and pour into a bowl. Set aside to cool while you make the date puree.
  3. Make the date puree: In a large bowl, add the dates and boiling water. Allow the dates to soak in the water for 10 minutes. Then pour both the water and the dates into a food processor, and pulse until you reach a puree. Set aside.
  4. Prep for the cakes: Preheat the oven to 350F. Generously grease a 6-cup large muffin pan with vegan butter or cooking oil, and set aside. Measure out the remaining ingredients for the cake.
  5. Make the batter: Whisk together the flour, baking powder, and baking soda in a small bowl. Set aside. In a large bowl, use a hand mixer to cream the brown sugar and vegan butter until fluffy. Add in the dairy free yogurt, vanilla extract, and date puree, and mix again until combined. Next, add in the flour mixture, and on low speed with the hand mixer, mix the flour into the wet ingredients just until combined. 
  6. The first bake:  Divide the batter evenly into 5-6 muffin cups (depending on how large you would like the sticky toffee puddings to be). Place the muffin tin into the oven and bake for 25-30 minutes. A toothpick should come out clean, and that’s how you’ll know they’re done. Remove the tin from the oven, and allow the cakes to cool for 10 minutes in the tin. Keep the oven on.
  7. Slice the cakes in half: After they’ve cooled in the tin, you can run a serrated knife along the sides of each muffin cup, and invert the pan onto a cooling rack, gently getting each cake out of the muffin cup. Allow the cakes to cool for 5 minutes, then slice each cake in half width wise. 
  8. Assemble the toffee puddings: Spoon about 1-2 tbsp of toffee sauce into each muffin cup. Then place the top halves of the sticky toffee puddings back into muffin cups. Then spoon another 1-2 tbsp of toffee sauce on top of each cake half, and place the bottom cake halves on top of the toffee. The cake should be from the bottom up: toffee, top cake half, toffee, bottom cake half. When you serve the cakes, they will be inverted. You should also still have some toffee sauce left. 
  9. Bake the cakes again: Place the muff tin back into the oven to bake for 10 minutes. Then remove from the oven and allow the cakes to cool for 5 minutes in the pan.
  10. Invert the sticky toffee pudding: Run a serrated knife along the sides of the sticky toffee puddings again, and carefully invert the muffin pan onto a cooling rack.
  11. Serve and enjoy! Plate each sticky toffee pudding, and top with the remaining toffee sauce and coconut whipped cream or ice cream. This dish is best served warm, fresh out of the oven. Enjoy!  

Notes

I do not recommend making this sticky toffee pudding ahead of time. You really want to capitalize off of the cakes being so moist and fresh, and the longer they sit out, the less moisture they’ll have. 

Gluten free: You can swap in 1 1/4 cup (or 125 grams) of oat flour for all purpose flour if you want a gluten free version. Add 1 tbsp of arrowroot starch to the oat flour as well. This will help the flour bind!