For me, love has always been like flan. I'm a believer in love at first sight, but in practice love has always come slowly and smoothly - friendship transitioning to butterflies and then to that first kiss. To appreciate flan, you need to take the time to melt it a little, get it out of its shell, and lastly to turn its world upside-down. Only then will you be treated to its true beauty: a hidden caramel layer that now shines front and center, stealing your heart.
After perfecting a cupcake recipe, don't top it with this dulce de leche buttercream frosting. Your tasters will be so frosting-focused that they won't notice the cake you worked so hard on. Save this sweet, salty, smooth dulce de leche buttercream frosting to top a cupcake gone bad - one that's too dry, ugly looking, or one where the batter overflowed in the oven. With a simple swirl, your cupcake will be redeemed. Isn't cupcake magic fun?
Today, my three year old told me that he had one hundred hugs for me. Cajeta, Mexican goat milk dulce de leche, is like that. It's not the kind of sweet that makes you want to gag (like a really bad pick-up line). Rather, it's an innocent sweet - so heartwarming that you get chills as it sinks into your soul.
Make your cajeta on a grey day, one where even getting out of your
pajamas seems like a burden. Wafts of milky sugar will be your sunbeams and the rhythmic motion of your wooden spoon circling the pot will be the light breeze swaying your hammock.
This cupcake recipe is the first recipe that I have ever created solely based on price. As part of the Hunger Challenge, I had $87 to spend on food for the week for my family of three - and as a cupcake blogger, I wanted to include cupcakes. For this recipe (and everything else we ate during the Challenge), I assumed that I had nothing in my pantry except salt and pepper. If I wanted to use vanilla extract, the cost of buying that vanilla extract would count against the total.
I ended up baking eight banana cupcakes with dulce de leche frosting. Each cupcake cost nineteen cents (thirty-three cents if you serve it with a scoop of homemade banana ice cream). The cupcakes themselves are simple and not overly sweet, but when you top them with the dulce de leche and eat them with the ice cream, they rival any of my pricier creations.
I've never made a soufflé before. Soufflés sounded like scary, fancy French food - something that Julia Child would have futzed over for months trying to perfect. I learned, however, that a soufflé (which means "puff up" in French) is just a cake with separated eggs. The beaten egg whites are used to give the cake lift - not so frightening. My soufflé is even less imposing since it's made in a cast iron skillet. Breakfast in a skillet is like a man in a cowboy hat. It doesn't matter how handsome the dish actually is; sticking it in the skillet gives it instant appeal.
Each bite of this lime, pineapple, and mascarpone soufflé is like eating warm lime clouds, pineapple sunshine, and a soft dulche de leche breeze. I see more soufflés in my future.
Dulce De Leche Step 1: Take one or two cans of sweetened condensed milk, remove the labels, and put them in your crock pot. Dulce De Leche Step 2: Completely submerge the can(s) in water. Dulce De Leche Step 3: Set to low and wait eight hours. Dulce De Leche Step 4: Wait for the cans to come to room temperature and open the cans. The Dulce De Leche Backstory
When I last made dulce de leche, I boiled milk and sugar on the stove top. You, my readers, flooded me with suggestions on alternate ways of making dulce de leche. Many of you suggested that I use a pressure cooker to make dulce de leche. That's a great idea, but I don't own one (it's one of the few kitchen gadgets that I don't own).
Rosie suggested that I use a slow cooker:
I happen to have a slow cooker so I decided to give that a go. But, I didn't quite use her method. I turned to the expert on all things slow cooker related, Steph at A Year of Slow Cooking.
Instead of slow cooking the dulce de leche on high for 4-6 hours, she makes dulce de leche on low for 8 hours - allowing you to go to bed and wake up to dulce de leche (arguably better than waking up to coffee).
Instead of opening the can, Steph leaves the can intact. As long as the can remains fully submerged, it shouldn't explode (I say this with some confidence after reading her post - including all of its comments - and trying it myself).
The downside, as you can see, is that the cans rust and get rust on the crock pot. You can easily remove the rust from the crock pot with a little Bar Keepers Friend.
The stovetop milk plus sugar dulce de leche tasted slightly better than the crock pot version, but the ease of the crock pot far outweighs any taste differences. I'll be using this method from now on.
Last week, I posted a cute Valentine's Day cupcake that is perfect for kids, the Shirley Temple Cupcake. This week, I present you with a sexy Valentine's Day cupcake, the chocolate dulce de leche cupcake.
What Makes this Valentine's Day Cupcake Sexy?
I think just saying the word dulce de leche is sexy. Am I alone in this? It's even more sexy if you say "cho-co-lat" with a French accent and then go all Latin with "dulce de leche." You combine two extremely sexy cultures into one cupcake.
This week, I made chocolate dulce de leche cupcakes. When I told my friends and family about it, the most common response was, "Huh? What is dulce de leche?"
"Dulce de leche in Spanish or doce de leite in Portuguese ('milk candy'), is a milk-based syrup. Found as both a sauce and a caramel-like candy, it is popular across Latin America."
How is Dulce de Leche Different from Caramel?
Everyone, myself included, has been tempted to call my dulce de leche caramel. However, dulce de leche is different from caramel. Caramel is simply sugar that has been heated. It becomes really sticky and very sweet and, of course, caramel colored. Dulce de leche is made from mostly milk with some sugar. It is also very sweet and caramel colored from the heated sugar in it, but it is not quite as sticky and has more of a soft, smooth flavor.
"One story involves the 19th century Argentinian caudillo Juan Manuel de Rosas. The story goes that in a winter afternoon at the Rosas house, the maid was making some lechada—a drink made with milk and sugar boiled until it starts to caramelize—and she heard someone knocking at the door. She left the lechada on the stove and went to answer the door; and when she came back, the lechada was burnt and had turned into a brown jam: dulce de leche.
It is, however, more likely to have its origins in Europe, possibly as the French confiture de lait: a popular similar legend dating back from the 14th century exists in the region of Normandy, involving a cook from the military troops who had the same culinary accident when making sweetened milk for breakfast. Variations of this legend refer to a cook in Napoleon's army."
When I goof up in the kitchen, things end up burnt. These people must have been in such shock to find a winning dessert rather than a burnt up mess.
Two Ways to Make Dulce de Leche
There are two ways to make dulce de leche.
Dulce de Leche Recipe One
I made my dulce de leche using a method I found out about from The Clumsy Cook. I also have to credit her for my whole interest in dulce de leche. It looked so tasty in her picture!
Ingredients:
1/2 gallon of milk
2 cups sugar (I used vanilla sugar to make it extra vanilla flavored. You can also put vanilla beans into the pot if you have some.)
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
Directions:
Pour milk, vanilla, and sugar into a pot over medium-high heat (make sure the pot is big enough so that milk won’t spill over the sides when it boils). Bring to a boil, whisking constantly.
Turn heat down and slightly simmer over very low heat for about 2.5 to 3 hours. Check the mixture every once in a while to make sure it isn't simmering too much. When done, stir until smooth and pour dulce de leche into jars. Refrigerate any leftovers.
Note: I had mine on the stove for 5 hours! It is possible that this was because I didn't whisk it enough at the beginning. I have a metal whisk and I didn't want to scratch the pot. I know, pots are meant to be scratched. However, my husband likes our pots to stay looking brand new and I didn't want to mess it up. It still came out perfectly; it just took longer. Just be sure to keep an eye on it. You'll know it's done when it starts sticking to the spoon. It won't really get thick until it gets off the stove and cools down.
Dulce de Leche Recipe Two
The second way to make dulce de leche is heat up a can of sweetened condensed milk in boiling water. I like to do this in a crockpot (get the details in my post on crockpot dulce de leche).
The interesting thing is that no one seems to know exactly what the drink is they are referring to in this scene. If it tastes at all like the dulce de leche I made, I could see how Sara Brown kept downing them.
would have futzed over for months trying to perfect. I learned, however, that a soufflé (which means "puff up" in French) is just a cake with separated eggs. The beaten egg whites are used to give the cake lift - not so frightening. My soufflé is even less imposing since it's made in a cast iron skillet. Breakfast in a skillet is like a man in a cowboy hat. It doesn't matter how handsome the dish actually is; sticking it in the skillet gives it instant appeal.
Dulce de leche directions:
I happen to have a slow cooker so I decided to give that a go. But, I didn't quite use her method. I turned to the expert on all things slow cooker related, Steph at A Year of Slow Cooking.
Instead of opening the can, Steph leaves the can intact. As long as the can remains fully submerged, it shouldn't explode (I say this with some confidence after reading her post - including all of its comments - and trying it myself).
The downside, as you can see, is that the cans rust and get rust on the crock pot. You can easily remove the rust from the crock pot with a little Bar Keepers Friend.
This week, I made chocolate dulce de leche cupcakes. When I told my friends and family about it, the most common response was, "Huh? What is dulce de leche?"
