Sara, one of my coworkers, hosted a tapas party (Spanish appetizers/snacks) on Saturday for the rest of us from our school. Those of us attending were asked to bring drinks or desert. I decided to be adventurous and go with desert, hoping to make a tres leches cake. Ok, it’s not Spanish, but it’s Latin American and I love it. I knew from the beginning this was going to be difficult, but figured I could do it with equal parts Google and determination. I was sure to photograph the process so I could share with everyone my amazing talent… or my pathetic attempt – whichever one became reality.
Now, perhaps the most important part of this desert is the cake, but I lack an oven, so I opted for a store-bought cake. Muang and I went to the grocery store Friday before work so I could pick up my needed ingredients. We found a nice dense cake with relative ease and heavy cream was with the milk where one would expect it. Finding sweetened condensed milk, however, was a little more challenging. Muang eventually typed it into her phone, got the Korean translation, and asked a store employee for assistance. It was with the powdered milk and baby formula, of course.
Friday night after work I mixed together the “glaze” in my cooking pot, since I didn’t have any bowls. There is also no such thing as cream in Korea (at least as far as we know), so I used some whole milk and heavy cream instead. As I mixed this concoction of cream and sweetened condensed milk that would be poured over the cake and left to soak overnight, I began to wonder what I was going to soak it in. I opted for my sole piece of Tupperware, which was a large square (it wasn’t quite big enough, so I had to cut off the end of the cake, but I’ll enjoy it later).
As I worked I thought about my task for the next day, and decided another shopping trip was in order for some much needed tools.
Saturday I made some new additions to my kitchen supplies and went to work on the frosting.
This required mixing 2 cups heavy cream with 8oz of sugar until “stiff peaks are formed”, according to Alton Brown. Well, my cream was measured in milliliters and I had no measuring utensils for the sugar. However, since I know (or Google knows) that 250ml is one cup, as is 8oz I used one of the cream containers (which was conveniently 250ml) as a measuring cup for my sugar. I know. I’m brilliant.
Back to mixing… I began to wonder if it was humanly possible to produce these elusive peaks without the aid of an electric mixer. Unfortunately (or fortunately) I ran out of time and had to stop beating before I had the chance to find out.
It wasn’t as amazing as Mom’s, but I think I did pretty well, all things considered.
2 comments:
Awesome! Looks good. I really learned to cook when I was in Africa about 6 years ago. What, no cream of mushroom soup? I was lost without it. A lot of good comes from having to use your ingenuity.
oh ya, I agree. Food photos/tutorials while you are in the midst are difficult. From what I've read, the pros achieve their awesome shots using a tripod and lots of natural light. The process still eludes me. You did a good job. I would rather see the random off picture than none at all!
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