Dulce de leche begins with a can of sweetened condensed milk and is cooked until it becomes a thick, caramel-like spread. Dorie says dulce de leche is readily available in stores but I made my own. There are several cooking methods and I ended up combining two of them.
I was tempted to cook the unopened can in boiling water but I was frightened to chance it. I have a friend from church who did this for years. She is from Argentina and this was the way she and her family always did it. But, one day the can exploded and she suffered a serious eye injury.
Here are cooking methods from Eagle BrandOVEN METHOD: Pour 1 can EAGLE BRAND® into 9-inch pie plate. Cover with aluminum foil; place in larger shallow pan. Fill larger pan with hot water. Bake at 425ºF for 1 hour or until thick and caramel-colored. Beat until smooth.
STOVETOP METHOD: Pour 1 can EAGLE BRAND® into top of double boiler; place over boiling water. Over low heat, simmer 1 to 1/2 hours or until thick and caramel-colored, stirring occasionally. Beat until smooth.
MICROWAVE METHOD: Pour 1 can EAGLE BRAND® into 2-quart glass measuring cup. Cook on MEDIUM (50% power) 4 minutes, stirring briskly every 2 minutes until smooth. Cook on MEDIUM_LOW (30% power) 20 to 25 minutes or until very thick and caramel-colored, stirring briskly every 4 minutes during the first 16 minutes and every 2 minutes during the last 4 to 10 minutes.
And then I found a SLOW COOKER METHOD:
Use a 4-quart slow cooker. Find an oven-safe dish to insert into your stoneware. You can use individual ramekins or a casserole dish. Carefully pour water all around the dish, until the water reaches three-quarters of the way up the sides of the dish. Open the cans of sweetened condensed milk and pour into the inserted dish(es). Cover and cook on low for 8 hours.
I started out by baking the milk in the oven but after an hour it was not as thick as I wanted. A little more time and I think it would have been perfect. I had bread that had to go into the oven so I transferred the partially thickened milk to a double broiler and finished it there.
yum… doesn’t that look good!
Playing Around ~ I had just a bit of chocolate glaze left over from another recipe, so I spread some on the flat side of a few cookies before sandwiching them together.Lovely!
1/2 t salt
Whisk together the flour, baking soda and salt.
Working with a stand mixer, preferably fitted with a paddle attachment, or with a hand mixer in a large bowl, beat the butter at medium speed until soft. Add the 3/4 cup of dulce de leche and both sugars and continue to beat until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes. Add the eggs one at a time, beating for 1 minute after each addition. Don’t be concerned if the mixture looks a little curdled- it will smooth out when the flour mixture goes in. Reduce the mixer speed to low and add the dry ingredients, mixing only until they disappear into the batter.
Spoon the dough onto the baking sheets, using a heaping teaspoon of dough for each cookie and leaving 2 inches between them.
Bake the cookies 10 to 12 minutes, rotating the pans from top to bottom and front the back at the midway point. The cookies should be honey brown with a light sugar crust, but they will still be soft, so remove the sheets from the oven but don’t touch the cookies for another minute or two. Then, using a wide metal spatula, transfer the cookies to a rack to cool to room temperature.
Repeat with the remaining dough, making sure you cool the baking sheets before spooning the dough onto them.
When the cookies are completely cool, spread the flat bottoms of half the cookies with a small amount of dulce de leche, and sandwich with the flat sides of the remaining cookies.
Makes about 30 sandwich cookies
How delicious! I have a can of condensed milk in my pantry, maybe I'll give this a whirl today!
Oh, my, these look heavenly! I'll have to give a try when I have someplace to take cookies…sure I can't be trusted with a batch of those 🙂
Blessings!
Gail
I've seen photos of cookies and dulce de leche but was too frightened to cook the condensed milk in the pan; these recipes are absolutely wonderful! Now I'm ready to try it. Have a great weekend.
Exploding cans how scary!
Joyce
Thanks so much for not only sharing this delicious recipe but also for letting me know about the can incident. I have always cooked my condensed milk in the can like you mentioned but I will definitely try your other suggestions from now on!
Best wishes,
Natasha.
These look delicious! What is even better, I have the cookbook! How did these ever get past me?
Those cookies look delicious! I have never tasted or tried to make dulce de leche. I am going to give it a go tomorrow. 🙂
ooh I Love that dulche de Leche
They look great! I've made it using your oven method and it was easy. Thanks for baking with me!
The cookies look lovely and I like your 'dulce de leche tutorial'.
You MADE those??? How come you don't weigh 200 pounds? I would not be able to resist eating every goody you create. They look delicious.
Mmmm…. don't those look amazing?!!
Your cookies look fabulous. Mine were a fail, but I think I need to try again. This time I'll put the sugar in!
Boy that looks good! Anything sweet I adore~
You amaze me! All of your recipes are WONDERFUL!! So kind of you to share~
Wishing you all the best,
Michelle
I heart your photo of the dulce de leche – yum!
Oh my gosh- those cookies look delicious.
My husband likes dulce de leche on vanilla ice cream.
I enjoyed visiting,
Laura
One of the girls from work makes her own caramel at Christmas time. That looks just way too good and the cookies, i can feel the pounds packing on 🙂