I find that one of the best things about cooking at home, in your own kitchen – besides the sheer pleasure it gives me – it is to know exactly what ingredients are going into my food. This is even more of a delight if you are allergic or intolerant to something.
I am lactose intolerant, and if you asked me 5 years ago how did I manage to eat pies, cakes and ice creams, my reply would be that I simply couldn’t eat it. Now I can say I can eat almost anything. What has changed? I make everything from scratch and substitute the ingredients with things that my tummy is happy with. So basically if there’s something you can’t eat for whatever reason, stop making excuses, get in the kitchen and start cooking! There are so many substitutions available out there so there is always a solution if you want to eat something that maybe you really fancy but can’t eat.
I have a recipe to illustrate this task: Dulce de leche. It is a paste like sweet made by cooking sugar and milk (among a few other things). It is delicious.
Dulce de Leche (makes 500ml)
1l full fat milk (for those lactose intolerant you can use the lactose free kind)
250g sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
1. In a ‘’tall’’ pan mix the milk and sugar and cook over medium heat until sugar has dissolved, constantly stirring.
2. Add vanilla and bicarbonate. Now the mixture will start to create a lot of foam which will rise so it is important to use a ‘’tall’’ pan. Lower the heat and continue to stir until the foam goes back down. If needed move away from heat so that the milk doesn’t overflow.
3. Leave it to gently simmer and give it a stir every 5-20 minutes. If the dulce de leche starts to stick to the bottom of the pan, you will need to stir even more often.
4. After 1hr on the hob spoon a bit of the mixture on a plate and check for taste and consistency. I like my dulce de leche with a caramelized hint to it so I left it ton the low heat for 1h30 minutes total.
I like to cook this recipe on low heat for longer and this way you don’t need to stir it so often. I don’t find it fun having to stand by the hob for over an hour. If the mixture stuck to the bottom a bit, you can rescue it by sieving it while still warm. Afterwards all you need to do it topour into warm sterilised jars and seal it well. It’s the perfect ingredient to ice cakes, better yet as filling for chocolate and vanilla muffins, as a sauce on ice cream, topping for waffles or pancakes, on a cheesecake (dulce de leche and cheese make the best combination) or you can simply just eat it off the spoon as a treat. Go forth and be creative!
As a disclosure I will say I have a very sweet tooth, so I always adjust sugar quantities in my recipes. If you would like a very sweet and extra thick dulce de leche you can use 460g of caster sugar for every 1l of milk.
I swear to you you will never get a shop bought dulce de leche ever again!
