Days are turning warmer and if there’s a dessert that’s better the colder it is it’s tres leches. This was my mom’s house CLASSIC summer dessert: tres leches. Always with whipped cream, fresh fruit and reaaaally moist inside, like it should be.
In summer it would DEFINITELY be topped with mango slices which are a dessert on their own in Perú. During winter or off mango season it would be canned peaches in slices as well. Of course, the fruit that it goes with is completely up to you and you can vary it according to what’s available at the market/supermarket. Still, I recommend that it has a bit of acidity as a counterpart to the sweetness of the tres leches.
Some people like tres leches with meringue, but not me haha. I prefer it with cream because the meringue is even sweeter than the tres leches so it ends up like a punch of sugar. With the cream, you can regulate the sugar by adding only a bit or none at all, which compensates for the sweetness. You cannot do that with a meringue because the amount of sugar needs to be double the weight of the egg whites in order for it to be perfectly full.
Another thing I want to specify is that you cannot make a layered cake out of this tres leches which you can sometimes find filled with dulce de leche. This is because it’s simply way too moist and it would be like trying to make a cake out of mud haha. Also, I don’t like it in this version because it’s sweet enough WITHOUT the dulce de leche, but I get that people with extremely sharp sweet tooth’s love it 🙂 <3.
This dessert is nicer the colder it’s served and in my opinion, it’s best to leave it overnight in the fridge to give the flavours a chance to come together. So it’s perfect if you have lunch because you can make it the day before and just whip cream and serve it when the time comes :).
Tres Leches Recipe
Ingredients
For the cake
- 3 eggs at room temperature
- 190 g sugar
- 130 g all purpose flour
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 1 tsp salt
- 50 g evaporated milk
- 1/2 tsp vanilla extract or essence
For the 3 milks
- 255 g evaporated milk
- 280 g condensed milk
- 210 g whipping cream
To garnish
- 200 ml whipping cream, cold
- 1 tbsp icing sugar
- fruit of choice
Instructions
For the cake
- Whip up the eggs with the sugar until you reach the ribbon stage. This happens when you can make a drawing with the batter on top of the surface and it doesn't sink back in immediately.
- Mix the flour, salt and baking powder. Add half to the batter through a sieve or colander and mix it in using folding motions. Repeat with the other half. Always be careful not to leave flour at the bottom of the bowl where it tends to sink.
- Mix in the evaporated milk and vanilla essence using folding motions with a spatula.
- Pour the batter into a 20x30cm/8x12in baking dish or pan bake in a preheated oven at 180°C/350℉ for 20-30min or until you can insert a stick at the centre and it comes out clean.
For the 3 milks
- Mix them and pour them onto the cake as soon as it comes out of the oven. This is really important to maximize absorption.
- Let cool to room temperature and refrigerate for at least 4 hours or ideally overnight to give the flavours time to develop.
To garnish (right before serving)
- Whip the cream with the icing sugar until fluffy.
- Garnish with the whipped cream and fruit of your choice. The nicest thing is to use fruit that have a bit of acidity like mangoes, peaches and berries.
3 comments
Delicioso , muchas gracias por tu salud recetas!
This was so so delicious!! Any tips for making the garnish look like the picture above? Do you make the icing sugar from scratch?
Hi Marci! I just fluffed the whipped cream with a spatula 🙂 I use store-bought icing sugar