gluten free date bread with coffee and ginger
Do you ever get an idea in your head and it just won’t go away until you do something about it? Well that’s why I’m making you look at sharing this date bread recipe. I have been obsessed! Obsessed I say! I have been thinking about date bread (and specifically gluten free date bread with coffee and ginger in it) for a few weeks.
The origin of the obsession goes back to the fact that my daughter is turning seven and she wants a fancy tea party for her birthday party. I have been collecting ideas for it on Pinterest and studying our favorite Fancy Nancy books.
One of the ideas in Fancy Nancy was to make little date bread canapés with banana as a tea party finger sandwich. My daughter loved the idea, and frankly I did too. [Hidden agenda, my in-laws are coming over in the morning too to see the birthday girl, so I figured if I made a couple of date breads, I could kill two birds with one stone.] And that’s all it took and I started to obsess.
This is how my swirl of recipe developing obsession went:
We read Fancy Nancy, I think Hmm, I love date bread.
I should do that for the party for sure.
I didn’t have my own healthy date bread recipe.
Yet!
And then I started thinking about how I could make it super awesome.
Oh, I know! I could make it with coffee to soften the dates and give it rich flavor without extra calories.
And I’d really like to make it SPECIAL and add some candied ginger, because did you know that candied ginger and dates are like totally BFFs?
And then and then and then….
Then I was like, well, if I’m going to do all this, I should definitely make it friendly to all of my peeps out there who are gluten free. Right? Because I am a team player, right?
And coconut oil is all the rage these days. So I’ll have to use that for sure….
You get the idea. A little cray-cray.
So that’s what I did. And a few tests later, and my date bread is in your face I have a date bread of my own to share with you. No need to hold your Fancy Nancy Pinkies Up! Gobble it up my friends:)
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gluten free date bread with coffee and ginger
- Prep Time: 20 minutes
- Cook Time: 1 hour
- Total Time: 2 hours
- Yield: 10 servings 1x
- Category: Snack
- Method: Oven
- Cuisine: American
Description
Gluten-free date bread with brown rice flour and almond meal. Sweetened and studded with soft Medjool dates and flavored with coffee and ginger.
Ingredients
- 1 cup halved/pitted soft Medjool Dates (about 5 ¼ ounces, pitted)
- 1 cup hot coffee, can be decaf
- 2 eggs, lightly beaten
- 1/3 cup coconut oil, melted if necessary
- 2 tablespoons honey
- 2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
- 1 ½ cup brown rice flour
- 1 cup almond flour, any clumps broken up
- 1 ½ teaspoon baking powder
- 1 teaspoon baking soda, sifted
- 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- ½ teaspoon ground ginger, sifted
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- ½ cup chopped toasted pecans
- ½ cup pitted chopped soft Medjool dates
- ¼ cup chopped soft candied ginger
Instructions
- Place halved dates in blender pitcher. Pour coffee over the dates and let sit until 70 to 90 degrees, about 30 minutes.
- Preheat oven to 325 degrees F. Coat a loaf pan with cooking spray.
- Puree dates and coffee until smooth. Add egg, coconut oil, honey and vanilla and puree until smooth.
- Whisk rice flour, almond flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, ground ginger and salt in a large bowl. Break up any clumps. Pour in date mixture. Stir until completely smooth and moist. Fold in pecans, chopped dates and candied ginger. Transfer to the prepared loaf pan.
- Bake until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out with only moist crumbs attached, 60 to 70 minutes. Let cool on rack in pan about an hour. Turn out and let cool completely before slicing.
Nutrition
- Serving Size: 1 slice
- Calories: 241
- Fat: 12 g
- Saturated Fat: 7 g
- Carbohydrates: 31 g
- Fiber: 2 g
- Protein: 4 g
Hello Katie,
You had me at dates soaking in coffee, so earlier this afternoon I made your delicious date loaf exactly as you called for…and guess what? Delicious! My boyfriend is still ohhing and ahhing about it…and he is not keen on GF baked goods. This bread has so much going for it! It’s a keeper for sure! Thank you for sharing your recipe and the inspiration behind it.
Thanks for the recipe. I made this with the ginger omitted and a few more dates and pecans instead. I probably overcooked it slightly – it wasn’t in the oven for quite 50 minutes but I think it probably would have done better if I had covered it half way through as it is a tad burnt on the outside/dry on the end – alternatively my oven may have been a touch hot. It’s very tasty. Perfect as I try and incorporate dates in my diet as I am 40 weeks pregnant and trying to encourage the baby to make an appearance (apparently dates help).
This looks amazing! I only cook with coconut flour and almond flour, so do you think I would be able to sub 1 cup coconut flour for the 1.5 cups of brown rice flour???
Thanks,
Amelia 🙂
You certainly can try Amelia. Having never tried it myself I can’t say for sure, but I think that ratio sounds like a good start. Let us know how it goes.
Fantastic recipe! Made a few changes, but it still turned out great. I tend to have bad luck with GF breads/baked goods. They typically turn out rock hard or gummy. No issues with this one, thank you!
Substitutes:
– Rice Flour for Bob’s 1-1 gluten free flour only because I didn’t have rice flour (kept Almond Flour as recipe noted).
– Eliminated Candied Ginger and Ginger Powder, I’m not a fan of the taste.
– Added additional 1/2 tsp Cinnamon Powder.
Delicious flavour, not too sweet, and a perfect bread texture. This is a go-to recipe from now on!
★★★★★
Hi Julie. That sounds great. I love the idea of using cinnamon instead of ginger. And so good to know about the 1:1 gf flour working. That’s great news! Thanks for rating. I really appreciate it.
Made this today. Had just enough of both flours in my pantry, but I did not have pecans, candied ginger or enough dates. I had just the one cup necessary to puree with the coffee, Had about a cup of cranberries left over so used them at the end for the additional dates that should have been added. I substitued walnuts for the pecans and just used ground ginger root for the candied ginger. It came out looking and smelling perfect, but it tasted a wee bit dry. Any suggestions on what to do to make it moister next time, I actually think the cranberries were a good compliment.
Thanks for coming back to let me know how it went. I think the full amount of dates would make the difference since they really make it moister. You could also try subbing in a couple tablespoons of quinoa flour for the rice flour next time.
Hello Katie,
I’m just looking for a sweet bread to make,
On the healthy side, and I came across this recipe it sounded really good! So I thought I’d give it a go
I was never a great cook or bake her, but I am Definitely becoming a great baker and cook as I have a lot of time on my hands, LOL
I replace the rice flour with banana flour which was a great choice! Everything else I kept as is. Miss Debra☺️Ty
★★★★★
I am so glad to hear you liked it! Thank you!
This recipe is excellent !
I don’t have rice flour, but do have tiger nut flour, which I used as substitute (fine).
I also do not use candied ginger.
The other ingredients & directions were followed precisely.
The directions are clear.
The results delicious !
Thank you, Katie Webster
★★★★★
I am happy to hear it worked out. I have to experiment with tiger nut. I am intrigued!