Tres Leches Cake

Tres Leches Cake

Here’s the thing about love…. allow me to speak as an authority on the subject for a moment.

The thing about love is this:  you have to fall into it with everything.  Arms flailing, smiling like a maniac, giddy beyond belief, with all of who you are.  You have to go big.  You have to leave nothing behind.  You have to risk it all.  That’s the only way it has a chance of working… right?

And even then… sometimes it doesn’t work.  And you fall flat on your face.  And it sucks.  And there’s no way that it won’t suck… so you just have to sit with the suck for a while.  And then sit with it some more…. and a little more still.

And then I suppose you separate yourself from all the suck and try again… later.  Waaaaaay later. Cause your face is sore from where you totally fell on it.

That’s how it works, right?

This helps… but isn’t always foolproof.

Know what also helps?  Cake.  Cake with milk.  So there.  Put that little gem in your brainhole.

Tres Leches Cake

Tres Leches Cake

I wanted to give you a closer look at this cake.  It really is special.

The cake base is a dense yellow cake flavored with just a hint of almond extract.  The cake batter has a lot of eggs in it.  So many eggs you might feel a little uneasy.  Not to worry.  Everything will work out.

I think the secret to this cake is pre-slicing the cake just before soaking it in milk.  I soak my cake slices for about 4 to five hours.  I’m not an overnight soaker.  I don’t like super soggy cake.

I love the coconut milk in this recipe.  Coconut milk and cinnamon and a hint of cardamom.  It’s rich… but still delightfully light… and just otherwise lovely.

Tres Leches Cake

Tres Leches Cake

Tres Leches Cake

makes 18 cubes of cake

adapted from Alton Brown

Print this Recipe!

For the Cake:

1 1/2 cups plus 1 Tablespoon of all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

4 ounces unsalted butter, at room temperature

1 cup plus 1 teaspoon granulated sugar

5 large eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1/2 teaspoon almond extract

For the Glaze:

1 (12-ounce) can evaporated milk

1 (14-ounce) can sweetened condensed milk

3/4 cup half and half

1/2 cup coconut milk

1 cinnamon stick

1 cardamom pod

3 Tablespoons aged rum

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Lightly oil and flour a 13 by 9-inch metal pan and set aside.

Whisk together the flour, baking powder and salt in a medium mixing bowl and set aside.

Place the butter into the bowl of a stand mixer. Using the paddle attachment, beat on medium speed until fluffy, approximately 1 minute. Decrease the speed to low and with the mixer still running, gradually add the sugar over 1 minute. Stop to scrape down the sides of the bowl, if necessary. Add the eggs, 1 at a time, and mix to thoroughly combine.  It’s a lot of eggs and the mixture will appear soupy.  Add the vanilla and almond extract and mix to combine. Add the flour mixture to the batter in 3 batches and mix just until combined. Transfer the batter to the prepared pan and spread evenly. This will appear to be a very small amount of batter. Bake on the middle rack of the oven for 20 to 25 minutes or until the cake is lightly golden and a skewer inserted in the center comes out clean.

Remove the cake pan to a cooling rack and allow to cool for 30 minutes. Slice the edges off the entire cake and portion into 18 cubes of cake.  Poke the top of each slice with a skewer or fork. Allow the cake to cool completely and then prepare the glaze.

Whisk together the evaporated milk, sweetened condensed milk, half and half, coconut milk, cinnamon and cardamom in a saucepan over medium heat.  Allow to just warm, cover and place in the fridge for 2 hours.  Stir in the rum.  Arrange the tres leches cake in a dish with 1-inch sides.  Pour the milks over the cake slowly.  Cover and refrigerate for at least 4 hours.  Most people like to leave the cakes to soak overnight…. but I don’t like overly soggy cake and find that four hours is juuuust fine.

Serve with slightly sweetened whipped cream.

Tres Leches Cake

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136 Responses

  1. How am I JUST NOW finding this in 2017?? I love trees leches cakes and I am totally diggin the coconut milk and cardamom adaptation! I like the rum too. Interestingly, I was told by an energy healer that I somehow had a connection to Joy the Baker, and I had no idea what she meant. I told her I grew up learning to bake with the Joy of Cooking book that my amazing grandmother Nana Joy had taught me out of and she was a phenomenal baker! She passed away in 2007, and I feel her with me all the time:) I feel the exact same way about love as you do too. Maybe it was a reminder I needed as my husband and I are going through a lot right now. Spirit can see things we cannot;) Thank you for the incredible recipe, and the reminder lol? Blessings to you!!

  2. Dear Joy,

    Thank you for the wonderful recipe! I made this cake for the first time this evening and it was a big hit with my family. My father said it reminded him of a cake he used to eat as child growing up in Belize. He absolutely loved this cake and this means a lot to me considering he is rather picky when it comes to food especially baked goods! The cake was divine! It was moist and sweet but not too sweet. The only thing I want to mention is that I baked the cake for 35 minutes instead of the recommended time of 20-25 minutes. All in all, this was a simple, yet wonderful treat and I look forward to making it again (many times lol) in the future!

    P.S. I just ordered your book and I CANNOT wait to try more of your recipes! Thanks again!

    K~

  3. Joy, I only have glass cake pans. Do i need to buy a metal cake pan for this recipe? Thank you!

  4. Hi Joy! In case you were wondering who was in and out of this recipe all weekend, it was me! I didn’t bookmark it and had to keep googling it while I was multitasking in the kitchen. And then again last night while I was linking it up in a post on the cocktail party I served it at.

    This recipe is AWESOME. We are still eating it several days later and it hasn’t broken down at all. SO good! xoxo

  5. When looking around for something to stress-bake I found this and though the recipe isn’t generally to my taste the explanation at the beginning was perfect. It was absolutely exactly what I needed to hear at this specific moment and I know I am late to the party of agreeing with the sentiment and that the commenting isn’t generally how I roll but thank you. Absolute and sincere thanks for helping in the slow process of standing up again.

  6. Rum and coconut milk! Yum!
    I’ve made tres leches cake a couple times using emeril lagasse’s recipe… he makes a light sponge cake and soaks it overnight with evap milk, cream, and condensed milk. I thought it might be soggy, but it was silky smooth and delish!

  7. Dear Joy the Baker, You have absolutely made my night, again. Your blog is my go to place for baking ideas. My friend is going to freak when I make this for her birthday tomorrow. The addition of the coconut milk….(and the rum….) made it SO much more awesome than regular tres leches. Yay.

  8. Indeed, it was one of two birthday cakes. (The other: chocolate buttermilk bundt cake with chocolate ganache.) Didn’t pour all of the milk mixture in, and now thinking of other evil uses: tres leches French toast? tres leches bread pudding? But tonight, just berries with tres leches sauce. Divine. Thank you Joy!

  9. Oh my gosh. Wish I’d seen this post a few months ago when my husband asked for tres leches cake for his birthday (September) and then my daughter asked for it for hers (December). I’d been piecing different recipes together, including the Alton Brown one, and had been totally thrown by the whole weighing of the flour in my kitchen-scale-less kitchen. Maybe this will be my son’s birthday cake next week :-)

  10. Joy, you are amazing!!! Your recipes are fool-proof, and now thanks to you my boyfriend lays at my feet begging for me to bake for him every weekend. Your Tres Leche cake is the best I have made to this day. Thank you, thank you for sharing! We need more ladies like you to make the world a sweeter place.

    Take care!
    Kim

  11. I made this Alton Brown recipe last week and I thought it was delicious, but that next time I’d try it with coconut milk and rum. Then I come here and found that you have already done it! Hurray! I can’t wait to try you adaptation, it is exactly what I wanted to change from the original. Except…I was thinking nutmeg, but I’ll try what you came up with because cardamom is awesome!

  12. I made your Tres Leches cake last weekend and it was heavenly. I topped it with fresh whipped cream and blackberries from my garden. Simply wonderful! Thank you for this recipe.

  13. Yay! Thank you so much for posting this recipe. I tried Tres Leches Cake in Peru a few years ago and absolutely adored it. Ever since, I’ve been looking for a recipe to try and recreate what I had, but nothing seems to be quite right. Your version looks an awful lot like what I had (except it came with bits of shaved chocolate on top) and I can’t wait to give it a try!

  14. Joy!!! I know you must get tons of posts every day and it`s very probable you won`t have time to read this BUT, I need to tell you you`re way my favourite sweet-treats-receipe- source. I`m from Chile and I’ve absolutely adored your choc-banana bread and your lemon-drenched cake and I’m soaking a tres leches cake right now. If I lived in L.A I would definetly pay you a visit with a nice thank you gift from this side of the world.
    Thank you for helping make life a bit sweeter.

  15. Hello joy,this is my 1st response to any blog.and the reason is ur delicious and soooo yummy recipe of tres leches cake .i made it last wednesday for a gettogether party and my cake was a greaaaaat hit.the taste was new 4everybody+unique .now it’s my duty to thank u sooooo much 4making my day.GOD bless u

  16. Oh my goodness! I made the tres leches cake for a Cinco de Mayo gathering and it was wonderful, delightful, fabulous and according to my daugther “OH MY GOD MOM THIS IS ADDICTIVE!”.

    Love this blog, love the recipes. Everything is so darn inspiring. Now I’m searching the site for a special dessert to compliment our Mother’s Day dinner with my family, something that will make my mom smile. I have no doubt I will find it here.

    Happy Mother’s Day to all the momma’s reading this blog!

  17. So I had never heard of this cake, but seeing as it’s Cinco de Mayo, I figured it was a good time to jump in and find a good use for my cardamom and coconut milk. And boy am I glad I did! I brought this cake to work so I wouldn’t eat it all by myself, and every single person who has tasted it came by to tell me the cake was amazing. One person told me he was going to “put in an order” so he could bring one home to his family! Never have I blushed so much at being complimented. Thanks, Joy, for posting this recipe!

  18. I love — LOVE — tres leches cake. And the best part is, it’s the kind of love where there’s no risk involved, no chance of pain or heartache (just a stomach ache if I eat more than I should). But in all seriousness, not to get all “It’s better to have loved and lost…” on you, but you’re right: you need to go into love with everything you’ve got. Because really, what’s the alternative? Closing yourself off — from other people, from experiences, from the world? That’s a pretty crappy way to live. It sounds like you have the right attitude and, trust me, the wounds will heal and before you know it, you’ll meet someone who will make you forget what it feels like to take a spill.

  19. Wow! You’ve just saved me — was thinking about baking one of these for Cinco de Mayo celebratory drinks on the roof this week and had no idea where to being … Now I’m all set. Thanks.

  20. I love your site! I really want to make this without having to buy anything, but I don’t have any rum. Is there anything I can substitute it with, or can I go without it?

  21. hey Joy… my face is hurting too… and as soon as i finish my move (this weekend) and unpack my kitchen i’ll be baking up a storm! not only is baking going to put a smile on my face… but i’m getting a new butcher block and that is totally getting me excited… hoping you get that giddy feeling again soon. obviously we all think you are the bomb!

  22. what an intro! i’m sorry though that you feel sad right now. but soon enough you’ll find a reason to smile again!

    i really like your posts here and i’ve been doing some when i have time. i have a question about this cake..can i leave out the cardamon pod?

    thanks for sharing your recipes. :)

  23. I am finally ready to get up from my fall. I have been baking my way through my heartache and you are so right, it definitely helps. I have made several of your recipes on my worst days. Thank you so much for sharing!

  24. No, you shouldn’t jump into love with arms flailing and a maniac smile unless you want to repeat the mistake of falling flat on your face. Over thinking love will make you inevitably fail. You shouldn’t have to plan what love is or how to act to get it or keep it. Love comes naturally and is a different experience each time. Be natural. Knowing yourself will help you get a good man and keep him. Love is easy. Baking the perfect cake is hard. ;)

    1. I disagree. I think I’m going to stick the the wild arms and smiles. It’s charming at the very least. It’s not over planned or unnatural. It’s just be knowing and being myself. And thats how that goes.

  25. For a second it looked like cornbread. Until I read the content. It doesnot look too difficult to make and look delicious. I will try it out next week.

  26. Aww Joy, I feel like a jerk for asking about your SO in the previous post. You’re awesome and it’s an inspiration to see you being so open about your failures in love, baking, whatever. I’ve fallen on my face too but looking back I kinda don’t regret it. It’s not worth doing something if you don’t mean it. Take care of yourself. We love ya!

  27. My SIL is Hispanic and his mom made this for his 21st birthday…. (she apparently made it for every birthday while he grew up… i.e. b/4 marriage!) and I’m thinking she is one of the 24 hour soaking group… it was a bit soggier than I could handle! But he did/does love it… and well “mom” made it what’s not to like?

  28. If the milk proportions are correct, simply guiding a knife along the edges of the cake and poking the top with holes that penetrate down to the pan, and then soaking, you should never wind up with soggy cake, even after an overnight soak. Perhaps this recipe suggests too much milk if your cake is soggy after the overnight soak. When a slice is removed, no additional milk should lie at the bottom of the pan.

  29. Shushmi – Half and Half is 1 part cream to 1 part milk. Typically used here in our coffee. Hope you find it (I think the milk that has the gold foil with the cream on top would work. When we lived in the UK we used to get it delivered at Christmas to pour on Christmas Pudding but I don’t know if it still comes like that).

    1. Thanks for the help! I was thinking it might be semi skimmed milk (I was confused why a joy the baker recipe would call for anything with half fat!). Gold foil milk was Jersey milk which was very creamy. Sadly not many people get milk delivered to the door these days :(
      THanks for the explanation!

  30. Lady, you are so right. That’s exactly what I’m NOT doing – just falling with everything I’ve got. Time to let go and enjoy the wind in my hair :-D

  31. Hey Joy, Just looking through the recipe and was wondering what exactly half and half is? I don’t think we get it here in the UK or at least I dont know that term. Can you help? or could I make this leaving it out? x

    1. Hey Shushmi, pretty sure it’s just skinny milk (skim, low fat, lite, etc). We call it everything here in Australia. Everything except half n half anyway :-)

      1. For the Brits, here’s a helpful guide to half and half from recipezaar:

        A mixture of half milk and half cream. It has 10-12% milkfat and cannot be whipped.
        plural: half-and-half

        Substitutions: Equal parts milk and cream
        1 cup half and half = 1 cup less 2 tablespoons milk plus 1 1/2 tablespoons melted butter

          1. Lol I know I totally though it was semi skimmed milk or skimmed milk too!

  32. That intro, that intro.
    Wow.
    I’ve found words can’t usually articulate what the “fall” is like–especially the first one— but reading this intro felt like “yep, that sums it up.” Especially the long after soreness.

    So, this young Chicana girl says thanks. For that, and for all the great recipes, and those that are sure to come…

  33. Hey Joy :)
    I’ve been meaning to make Tres Leche cake for a while now… But I have to ask… is the rum absolutely necessary? Is there a non alcoholic substitute for that?

  34. Aw, I’m so sorry Joy! You’re right – jumping in with everything you got is necessary, but it makes for such a hard fall. I hope you’re smiling again soon! And as an aside, I have Tres Leches Cake scheduled for Thursday! Great minds think alike :)

  35. The giddy love part totally makes up for the face falling love part. And then you find the ever lasting love part – and 6 years of marriage later you still get giddy, with no worries of face falling. But you (and I really mean me) still want cake!

  36. I love the big pan you baked the cake in. : ) And I agree that to really give love a chance, you have to jump in head first and with both feet (like some crazy a**ed dive) . If you’re tentative, it will never be as exhilarating, -your heart will be safer but won’t get the chance to grow. I sincerely believe that my heart grows whenever I’ve opened it as far as it will go, and it never shrinks back down even when it gets broken. Love is a good thing even when it hurts.

  37. Last summer I fell flat on my face too and you know what I did for all the spare time I suddenly seemed to have? I started baking a lot. It helped so much, was fun to make stuff and have something tasty at the end! Hoorah!

    This recipe looks AMAZING and I cannot wait to try it! I love baking with coconut milk!

  38. That looks great. My husband is Mexican, and I have twice made this cake, went MENTAL! I used the rompope liquor and everything, poking holes, waiting for this cake to soak it up.

    I love the idea of cutting the cake first, using the rum and the coconut milk.

    I am changing my recipe. Thanks for the inspiration.

  39. Oh Dear, I think I need to bake something, too. My face hurts & I’m afraid to try again. But I know I will, after my face heals a little bit. In the meantime, I’m going downstairs right now to see what’s in my pantry needing to be baked into a nice bandage. Good luck to all of us with tender faces and hopeful hearts.

  40. Joy, this is unfortunate. I hope your face falling brings new perspective and new ideas, for when our emotions are the worst, our creativity explodes. As a musician/chef/painter/actress I can tell you that you may just find your best work out of this

  41. Gorgeous – check!
    Cute personality – check!
    Amazing culinary skills – check!
    Intelligent and talented – check!

    Ok – so you need to work on being ugly, boring, terrible at cooking, and stop being so bright.

    I don’t get it?!

  42. My face is broken right now too. I hear that cake makes an excellent bandage.

    Most sad of all, I haven’t felt like baking one bit since “the fall”, maybe having something to do with the fact that he was the one who got me my beloved mixer.

    Here’s hoping for a speedy recovery for both of us.

  43. Face falling sucks. I haven’t done it in so long that I forget and might try it again some day. In the meantime, I want this cake. This cake will not hurt my face or my brainhole. (Maybe my tummy because of the milk, but that’s what enzyme pills are for…)

    xoxo Joy – and a face cushion for you for next time.

  44. I don’t know, sometimes I think you have to know the difference between love an lust and that’s hard to do sometimes. When you are in love, I’d agree you have to be there completely.

    I couldn’t make these cakes the day before because I have people who can’t eat baked goods after 24 hours. Anything baked has to be consumed right after making it. What isn’t eaten goes in the trash unfortunately. These sound good though.

    1. i quite honestly don’t think the poor girl has been going out w someone for months just out of lust…

      i’ve made this cake once and you can make it the same day… just bake early morning and soak it for a couple hours.

  45. You literally read my mind, this is scary. I went on your site to see if you had a tres leche cake and of course you just posted one. Like I said, reading my mind!

  46. This would be perfect for Cinco de Mayo! Although, I think I’d sub almond milk for coconut as you suggested to some. Not allergic, but I am not a coconut lover (*hides*). Unless it doesn’t taste very coconutty? I love curries with coconut milk, but don’t taste the flavor of it in those.

  47. I’ve always wanted to try tres leches, but I have a mild lactose intolerance. Milk in baked goods is okay, and in ice cream (lucky coincidence! I know) and yogurt, but straight up milk is not so good. I wonder if I could substitute something for the condensed and evaporated milks? Otherwise, I’ll just make it for other people – it looks beautiful!

  48. mmmm…..milk soaked cake…… (that should sound like homer). can’t wait to make this.

    Also loved “put that in your brainhole”. So quoting that!

  49. Oh, Joy. A broken face and only a soggy cake to rest your head on. Life is mysterious. And wonderful. And sometimes filled too many lessons we don’t want to learn. Ones that hurt. Here is what I will tell you about love, it is the only thing I know for certain about it: What your mind wants and what your soul needs are rarely the same thing; but the man that touches your soul—that deep, true you that even you avoid looking at sometimes—will be a true partner. For life. I can’t tell you how to find him. I can only tell you that he more than likely won’t look how you expect, have the education you imagined, or any of the myriad things you have listed on the “husband material” job application. But he will do his job better than the ones with gleaming resumes.

  50. I hope you haven’t ‘fallen on your face.’ If you did, the faller is missing something special from the fallee.

    P.S. Drooling over the keyboard at the cake.

  51. Looks delicious. Thanks for finding a yummy way to subsitute cake flour with all purpose flour!

    Do you ever frost the cake or does that do it an injustice?

  52. Oh boy, I’m a ‘throw it all in, go big or go home’ falling in love kinda gal, and i’ve broken my face many times too. but it only has to work once, and when you’re both free-falling crazily something magical happens in the universe and there’s soft fluffy pillows waiting for you. or something like that.

    This cake makes me wish I wasn’t lactose intolerant.

  53. I wish I had known about this cake years ago… my face was pretty much perpetually sore for, oh, I don’t know, all of college. I had to use ice cream – it worked, sort of. But this looks way better. And you know what? even when you think all that falling and flailing has calmed down, sometimes you still get sore. I shall call this ‘my-husband-is-being-an-idiot cake’ and not let him have even a tiny sliver until he apologizes!

  54. Duh! I make this frequently but never thought to cut the pieces of the cake first and then douse them in the milk triple threat. I have never liked it that the sides don’t get as milk filled as the center. Now I know why. Thanks!!!

  55. special doesn’t begin to cover tres leches. tres fantastic. tres amazing? tres stupendous! too difficult to have as a second wedding dessert? hmmmm…

    cheers,

    *heather*

  56. Tres Leches is my favorite!! i wil have to try this recipe. i only got brave enough to try my own a few months ago!

  57. Awesome. Now to take this recipe and try and make the version they sell at the Kogi truck (with chocolate and yummy crunchiness on top). Mmmm, Kogi. Only in LA :)

  58. Hi, Joy. Say I needed to make the cake more than 4 hours in advance, but I also didn’t want it soggy. Could I soak the squares for 4 hours and then take them out of the liquid and serve them a day later? Or does this cake really need to be served the day it’s made?

    1. I made this cake the day before i served it. I just double wrapped the entire unsliced cake in plastic wrap and left it at room temperature. The day I was to serve it. I sliced the cubes, poured over the milk covered the dish and left them to soak for 4 or 5 hours. Hope that helps!

  59. My friend had a tres leche cake. She’s from Mexico and it was very important to her. In fact, so important that her brother spent $5,000 on her tres leche! And every single crumb was gone….eaten…devoured. It was sooooo good.

    So if it has milk, flour and eggs, does it qualify as breakfast food? I mean cereal has lotsa sugar, so why not!?

  60. I’m allergic to coconut (I know, right?!), so is there something else I can substitute it with? I’m not sure if condensed milk is the way to go, since the textures and sweetness are not totally comparable. Please help, because seriously, this looks like heaven and I’d love to go to town on a slice with the hubby. Thanks!

  61. Oh, poo! This absolutely fascinating and delicious looking cake is a no-no for me. I’m allergic to coconut (but I love the taste of it)! SIGH!

  62. I’ve never had tres leches with coconut milk–what a great idea! But I can hear my favorite puerto rican protesting that this cake NEEDS a meringue topping (perhaps browned) and some cherries. Must have cherries!

  63. sweet and delicious cake so it seems… and even sweeter and wise way of dealing with ‘face-falling’… hopefully the cake will make you smile for a little while!

  64. Mmmmm… the first time I saw this cake was at the Pioneer Woman’s site… She didn’t use coconut milk though, and it sounds PERFECT for this cake!

    I love that first part you wrote. You’re amazingly eloquent and funny, even about the sometimes most heartbreaking subjects. I hope the cake made you feel much better! ;)

    Wei-Wei

  65. hmm, yum yum yum! what a coincidence!
    i had never heard about this cake until my lovely flatmate from the dominican republic told me about it and i knew i was gonna like it!
    apparently she told a chef at school about it you immediately asked her to make one the very same night. which she did. a whole big double batch for the chefs at school and another one for me! ;D
    because students wanted some too she had to make another one the next day and surprisingly they came out quite differently. her recipe is a good bit different to yours anyway as it includes dulce de leche instead of coconut but which she wasnt able to get and substituted with guava jam…
    i preferred the first batch that was swimming in the delightful liquid and was really soggy to the second drier and desnser one that tasted a whole lot more of rum. i know you like your rum… but personally i believe itd be even better with the dulce de leche! dulce de leche makes everything better! ;P
    hers also had meringue on top which i scraped off because i felt it added unneccessary sweetness. now i wanna try your recipe or make an adaptation of the both of them…oh boy, delicious or what?!

  66. Oh, Joy. You have such a delightful and humorous way of describing some of the most complicated (and sometimes) painful things about life. We all adore you for it. Also, I’m kind of a Tres Leches fanatic, so I adore you for that, too ;) I’m off to buy some condensed milk!

  67. Oh Joy, those look like little squares of heaven. I bet they’re great with the coconut milk! I gotta try this as soon as exams are over…

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