Dulce De Leche

Here is another recipe for you all that I got from my new book on Argentine cooking.  I am sure many of you have tried Dulce de Leche in one form or another.  It has become quite popular in the last couple of years with companies coming out with lattes and ice creams of that flavour.  Most of the time it doesn't seem to taste quite right though.  At least in my opinion of course ;)  Either way, it was and still is one of my favourite sweet indulgences.

There are two basic ways to make Dulce de Leche.  One way is using condensed milk and the other is this way I am going to show you now.  Either way works, although I must say that the condensed milk produces a bit of a better dulce to work with.  I will eventually post how to make it that way as well.

Oh and just a warning - making Dulce de Leche is a timely process.  So don't attempt to make this if you need it quickly or have to go out.  No matter how you make it, with condensed milk or otherwise, it can take several hours.

This recipe should make roughly 1 cup of dulce.

Ingredients:

2 cups milk

3/4 cup sugar

1 tsp vanilla

dash baking soda

Method:
Combine the milk, sugar and baking soda in a small saucepan and bring the mixture to a boil.  Lower the heat and keep the mixture to barely a simmer for about 2 1/2 hours while stirring occasionally.

Eventually over time your mixture will begin to take on a golden color like this:

Once it starts to gets to a thick and spreadable consistency (something like peanut butter) you can add the vanilla and let it cool.  This is what mine looked like just before I removed it from the heat.

 

As I was saying before, this is only one way of cooking this.  Hopefully soon I can post the other way of doing it and you can decide which tastes better.  Worth a try either way! Enjoy!