Tres Leches Cake:
The history and the recipe
Produced by Kayla Brackett, Nailah Brown, Jamir Graves, and Kelly
Today we'll be teaching you how to make Tres Leches Cake!
This iconic light dessert is usually a sponge cake that is soaked in three different types of milk: evaporated milk, condensed milk, and heavy cream, resulting in a sweet and moist cake. Tres leches cake originated in Mexico and is popular throughout Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Cuba, Puerto Rico, Guatemala, Costa Rica, and many other Latin American countries.
In the 19th century, there was a recipe going across Mexico for a bread cake that was soaked in wine and topped with custard. This is thought to be inspired by Italian tiramisu or the English trifle. With the European influence in Mexico during the 19th century, it goes with little explanation of why these soaked recipes became popular in the New World using European ingredients like custard, bread, and wine.
In the 1930s when the Nestle Company opened up plants in Mexico during World War II, a recipe for Tres Leches was printed on the outside of the evaporated milk, condensed milk, and cream cans. Nestle is held responsible for taking the Tres Leches Cake mainstream. All recipes in Mexico use a combination of evaporated, condensed, and cream in their recipe even today.
