![]() ![]() In 2003, Häagen-Dazs and Blue Bell even debuted a tres-leches-flavored ice cream. Its popularity has also moved northward as it’s long been a staple of trendy taquerias in Austin and a familiar item on restaurant menus in Miami. Nowadays, tres leches is the standard celebration cake for much of Central America ( including Puerto Rico). And so the Mexican recipe with its roots in old-world Europe found its way onto market shelves throughout Latin America. Around this time, perhaps to boost sales in the local market, Nestlé began printing recipes for tres leches cake to go on their cans. War caused obvious distribution problems throughout Europe and Asia, so Nestlé expanded production into Latin America where business flourished. ![]() Canned milks were so popular for military use that during the World Wars, many companies such as Nestlé - which had been canning milk since the mid-1800s - had a hard time keeping up with demand. Canned milk - which is made by removing about 60 percent of the water content - was first developed in the mid-19th century and gained widespread use as a military field ration since it was easily transported and had a long shelf life. The cake tradition transitioned to what would be recognized as tres leches with the invention of canned milk. Dishes such as English trifles, Italian zuppa inglese, or Portuguese sopa dourada had been around for centuries prior, so it is likely that antes were a new world iteration of an old-world favorite. It’s not hard to connect the dots from these antes to the tradition of soaked cakes in Europe. Nineteenth-century recipes exist for antes, or sherry soaked cakes with custard, fruit, and nuts, in the Mexican states of Sinaloa and Oaxaca. Plenty of countries claim to have invented tres leches, but Mexico has the strongest claim to the original recipe. It may sound like an odd dessert choice to the uninitiated, but the cake is absurdly popular in Latin America. The three milks in question are evaporated milk, condensed milk, and whole milk or heavy cream. While recipes vary from place to place, tres leches is essentially a sponge cake soaked in a milk mixture and topped with whipped cream or meringue. It turns out that there’s a lot about tres leches that you wouldn’t expect, from its origins in medieval Europe to its corporate sponsorship in Latin America to its sudden fame halfway around the world in Turkey. But I discovered - as anyone who tries it has - that it is actually very delicious, and that the wet, spongy texture is surprisingly refreshing. As a middling Spanish student I gathered that this must be a “three milks cake” though I had no idea what that meant, and looking at the leaky whitish-yellow cube, I didn’t really think I wanted to know. It was my first time experiencing the immense hospitality of the people of Honduras, and it was my first time trying pastel de tres leches. And yet, at the end of the meal, out came several of the wait staff singing feliz cumpleaños and carrying a giant cake to the table. I wasn’t expecting any kind of recognition for it, apart from a “happy birthday” from my dad, who was also on the trip. ![]()
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