Dulce de Leche, Hazelnut & Coffee Tres Leches Cake
After making this cake for the first time while doing my ‘baking around the world’ series, it has become my partners favourite sweet treat. He’s asked for it every birthday since.
For Easter this year we ate out for our sunday lunch so I really wanted to bring some homemade dessert for afters. I thought tres leches cake was perfect but I wanted to make it with a twist since I always make a very traditional one. Little did I know it would be this good.
The sponge has a little ground hazelnut which offers a lovely complexity in an otherwise light vanilla sponge. I’ve added in a lot of coffee into the three milk soak and whipped up a sumptuously soft dulce de leche cream to top it all. The top almost looks too good to eat with swirls of rich amber from the dulce de leche, burnished hazelnuts and smatterings of heady cinnamon. A real joy to eat and one that you’ll definitely want seconds.
Ingredients - Makes one 9x13inch baking tray
Sponge:
210g plain flour
3/4 tsp baking powder
Pinch of salt
50g ground hazelnuts
5 eggs
220g sugar (split 200/20)
125ml whole milk
1 tsp vanilla
Soak:
1 x tin of condensed milk (397g)
340ml evaporated milk
160ml whole milk
5 tbsp instant coffee powder
Topping:
500ml double cream
150g dulce de leche, plus rest of tin for swirls *
50g roasted hazelnuts, roughly chopped
ground cinnamon
Method
Preheat your oven to 175C. Butter a 9x13 inch baking tray.
Sieve together the flour, baking powder & salt in a large bowl. Add in the ground hazelnuts. Whip the egg whites in a stand mixer until frothy. Gradually add 20g of sugar and whisk until stiff peaks. Set aside in a seperate bowl & place the egg yolks into the bowl of the stand mixer. Whip until pale before gradually adding in the remaining 200g of sugar. Continue to whisk until pale and fluffy. Gradually add in the milk & vanilla. Pour the milk/yolk mixture into the dry ingredients and mix to combine (careful to not overmix here.) Beat in a little of the whipped egg whites to loosen the cake batter before folding in the rest in three additions. Pour the batter into the prepared tin & spread into an even layer. Bake for 20-25 minutes until golden & a skewer inserted into the center comes out clean.
While the sponge is cooling, warm the milk from the soak ingredients and whisk in the coffee powder. Whisk in the condensed milk and the evaporated milk. While the sponge is still slightly warm (not hot), poke holes all over the top using a fork. Pour over the milk soak, cover & chill for 3 hours or overnight.
When you’re ready to serve; whisk the double cream & 150g of dulce de leche together until reaches soft peaks. Don’t take it too far, you want it to be just spoon-able. Spread the cream over the soaked sponge. Swirl in dollops of dulce de leche, dust with some ground cinnamon and sprinkle over the chopped roasted hazelnuts. Serve (or chill and serve when you’re ready.)
*For the dulce de leche; remove the wrapper from a tin of condensed milk. Place the tin of condensed milk in a deep saucepan before filling it with boiling water, making sure the tin is completely submerged with a few inches of water above. Place over low heat for 5 hours, ensuring that you top up the water throughout so that it is always submerged. Please be careful here, if the tin doesn’t remain submerged, it can explode. After 5 hours, remove from the heat and leave to cool completely before taking out of the water. This is your dulce de leche. Do not attempt to open the tin while still hot.
