Tres Leches Cupcakes

A couple of months ago, I surveyed my coworkers  at the store where I work (I have two jobs, three if you count writing for The Feisty Foodie) for their favorite desserts, and tres leches cake came up a few times.  I’ve never made it before and decided this would be a good opportunity to get creative.  My biggest challenge was not the cake itself,  it would be schlepping such a thing on public transportation that was going to be the hurdle.  Because my week to provide lunch for my study sessions with the Feisty Foodie was coming up, I wanted this tres leches cake to be bento-friendly, though I think just about anything can be incorporated into bento.  Maybe the Feisty Foodie will chime in and educate us (okay, me) on what can go into a bento box.

As you know from last week, cupcakes are the perfect portion size (unless you use one of those jumbo muffin tins), perfectly portable, fits into many lunch containers, and everyone likes having their very own little cake.  At least, I do!  So tres leches cupcakes they are!  I also made a whole cake.

Tres leches cake, or three milks cake, is traditionally made with a lightly sweet, cinnamon-scented cake with sweetened condensed milk, evaporated milk, and cream poured over the top.  I’ve only had a few pieces of tres leches cake in my life but noticed that all of them were kind of soggy.  I wanted to avoid that in my cake.

I wanted to make dulce de leche as a supplemental flavor for my version of this dessert.  All you do is put an unopened can of sweetened condensed milk into a pot with enough water to cover and cook away.  Several sources have told me it only needs to be simmered for two to three hours, while my friend Steven, co-owner of Joey Biscotti, told me I should cook it for EIGHT hours.  Because I heart Steven to bits, I took his advice and simmered it on low for eight hours.  I also cooked another can on medium-high heat for an hour just for comparison.   Let it cool completely before you open the can, folks!  This is what it looks like:

Can you guess which can this is?  Neither can I!

While I really loved the caramelly flavor of the dulce de leche that was simmered for eight hours, I am not willing to spend that much time on it (sorry, Steven!).  The can that was boiled at medium-high for an hour tasted almost as good and allowed me to get the ingredients of the cake together in the meantime.

Whipped dulce de leche cream

I impulsively decided to use some of the dulce de leche in the whipped cream topping.  This required whisking some of the heavy cream into the dulce de leche to lighten and loosen it enough to be blended into the cream in the mixing bowl.

Some of the dulce de leche, evaporated milk, and cream

Cake batter

Naked cake

Now as I said, tres leches cake has three milks poured over the top.  I poked holes all over the cake with toothpicks, though I think in the future, I’m going to use chopsticks; toothpick holes are just too tiny to allow the thick milk mixture to seep into.  Don’t worry about how it will look because the surface of the cake will be covered up with the whipped dulce de leche cream.  I brushed the milk mixture over the top instead of just dumping it into the pan, then spread the whipped cream over it before piping the dulce de leche on top.  Now, my decorative piping skills are not all that good, so please don’t judge:

I think in the future, I’m going to avoid using dulce de leche on top the way I did here; it wouldn’t stick to the whipped cream (duh) and just came apart when I cut the cake.  Next time, I’m going to pipe the dulce de leche on the chilled cake and then top with the whipped cream.

See the tracks of the three milks?

I put each piece of cake into its own little foil cupcake liner.  Use this or a grease-proof liner for yours

Oh yeah, I did say I made cupcakes, didn’t I?

My two-tiered cupcake carrier

Tres Leches Cake

Milk Mixture:
1/2 can (7-oz) dulce de leche
1 14-oz can evaporated milk
1/2 pint heavy cream

Whipped Dulce De Leche Cream:
1/2 can (7-oz) dulce de leche
1 pint heavy cream

Cake:
½ cup cake flour
¼ cup unbleached all purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
¼ teaspoon table salt
½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 pinch ground nutmeg
3 tablespoons whole milk
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
5 eggs, room temperature
¾ cup granulated sugar

Instructions

To make dulce de leche: peel labels off two 14-oz cans of sweetened condensed milk, place in large deep pot of water, and bring to boil over medium heat. You can boil more cans if you want extra dulce de leche.  Just be sure you use enough water to cover the cans.  Cook for 1 hour.  Let cans cool before opening.  The dulce de leche will be very thick.  Scoop/pour contents of one can into a piping or ziplock bag.

Milk mixture:

Whisk dulce de leche, evaporated milk, and heavy cream together until well blended.  Set aside.

Whipped dulce de leche cream:

Whisk together the remaining half-can of dulce de leche with 1/4 cup of heavy cream until it’s smooth.  Whip the remaining cream to medium peaks, then fold dulce de leche mixture in.  Place into another piping or ziplock bag and store in refrigerator.

For the cake:

1. Adjust oven rack to lower middle position and heat oven to 350 degrees.  Line standard muffin tins with grease-proof cupcake liners.  Whisk flours, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, and nutmeg in a medium bowl. Heat milk and butter in a small saucepan over low heat until butter melts. Remove from heat and add vanilla; cover and keep warm.
2. Separate three of the eggs, placing whites in bowl of standing mixer fitted with whisk attachment and reserving the 3 yolks plus remaining 2 whole eggs in another large mixing bowl. Beat the 3 whites on high speed (or whisk) until whites are foamy. Gradually add 6 tablespoons of the sugar; continue to beat whites to soft, moist peaks. (Do not over-beat.) Transfer egg whites to bowl with yolk/whole egg mixture.
3. Beat yolk/whole egg mixture with remaining 6 tablespoons sugar. Beat on medium-high speed until eggs are very thick and a pale yellow color, about 5 minutes (or 12 minutes by hand). Add beaten eggs to whites.
4. Sprinkle flour mixture over beaten eggs and whites; fold very gently with a large rubber spatula. Make a well in one side of batter and pour milk mixture into bowl. Continue folding until batter shows no trace of flour, and whites and whole eggs are evenly mixed.
5. Immediately portion batter among prepared baking pans; bake until cake tops are light brown and feel firm and spring back when touched, about 12-15 minutes.  Using a skewer or chopsticks, poke holes all over the still-warm cakes.  Allow to cool about 30 minutes.
6. Baste milk mixture over cupcakes.  Chill, uncovered, in refrigerator for three hours or until firm.  Cut the tip or one corner of bag of dulce de leche and pipe onto each cupcake in thin, even pattern before GENTLY spreading (you can also choose not to spread the dulce de leche to avoid tearing the tops of the cupcakes).  Repeat with whipped cream mixture.