Dulce de leche bought from the shops is good, but the stuff you make yourself is even better. This silky South American treat is made by cooking sweetened condensed milk at a very low temperature for many hours. This simple process of heating sweetened milk will change you life. You can use it as a filling between two cakes, dollop it over ice-cream, swirl it through whipped cream, eat it straight from the jar…
My favourite way of using home-made dulce de leche – aside from the aforementioned jar method – is to sandwich it between cookies. It takes your biscuit game from wow to WOAH.
Be aware that creating the sauce is a slow burn. Not literally – you don’t want it to burn – but it will take eight hours. If you’re clever you’ll do it overnight and wake up to the promise of sweet, sweet caramalised sauce later in the day.
The contract between the crunch of the cookie and the soft, supple sensation of the dulce de leche is what good food is all about.
An added bonus about this recipe – you can make these lush, buttery cookies and serve them as is. No need to do the whole dulce de leche thing if you don’t want. I won’t judge.
Being the ultimate Donna Hay fan girl I used her cookie recipe and as always it was perfection. I cut my cookies with a fluted cutter for a pretty look.
GATHER:
170g unsalted butter, softened and diced
1 cup icing sugar, sifted
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 egg
2 teaspoons honey
2¼ cups plain flour, sifted
1 teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
LET’S GET TO IT:
Preheat oven to 180°C and line two baking trays with non-stick baking paper.
Beat butter, sugar and vanilla in the bowl of an electric mixer until pale – this should take around five minutes.
Add the egg and honey and beat until combined.
Sift over the flour, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda and beat on low speed until a dough forms – do not over-beat.
Flatten into 2 discs, wrap in plastic wrap and place in fridge for half an hour.
Roll dough between two sheets of non-stick baking paper until 5mm thick and use a cutter to cut rounds from the dough, re-rolling as necessary.
Place on baking trays and bake for 5-9 minutes or until the edges are golden and centres are still a little soft. Cool on wire racks.
When completely cold spread dulce de leche on half the biscuits then sandwich with the remaining biscuits.
dulce de leche: Place the unopened tin of sweetened condensed milk in a slow cooker, fill slow cooker with water, ensuring the tin is completely submerged, and cook on low for eight hours. You may need to top the water up a few times. Remove from water with tongs (the tin will be super hot) and allow to cool for a few hours before opening. Once opened place in a sealed container in the fridge.
