It’s safe to say that Tres Leches Cake is the most well-named dessert out there. There’s no beating about the bush here; the title translates to ‘three milks’, a perfectly succinct description of the cake’s star ingredients: evaporated milk, condensed milk and whole milk. That’s bad news for those who aren’t a fan of milk.
Good news for me though, as the moment I heard The Harley Café at Welbeck were serving it (£4.25), I knew it was a Tribudishional must.
As is usually the case when it comes to discussing food’s origins, there are many differing opinions, and tres leches cake is no different. Many claim this decadent dessert to have originated in Mexico, and its prominence on the menus of Mexican restaurants worldwide reinforces this idea. Others however, argue that it is a Nicaraguan dish – a product of reduced trade tariffs on canned milk products from the US in the 1930s.
What most can agree on though, is that the pudding has strong ties with Europe, especially to the English trifle and Italian tiramisu. This is due to the cake’s consistency: a heavily soaked sponge, often topped with some form of whipped cream. What sets tres leches apart from the others though, is its remarkable characteristic of being both incredibly rich, and remarkably light – something The Harley Café achieved flawlessly.
Perhaps it’s down to the fact that no butter or oil is directly involved in the cake’s creation, it’s fluffy texture instead relies on egg whites, which are separately whipped with sugar and folded into the batter (similar to a chiffon cake in its preparation). The sponge is then soaked in the tres leches sauce and left overnight to completely absorb all of the liquid.
Once ready, the sponge should take on a kind of texture gradient, ranging from an airy top to a moist base, evidenced in my slice in the photo above. It’s one of the few cakes out there where a soggy bottom is desirable.
Now, tres leches is not meant to be powerful when it comes to taste; instead a creamy sweetness is sought after, something most similar to that is best described by, well… milk. This was exactly what I got, with the sweetened condensed milk most pronounced in the cake’s wetter sponge.
The danger with tres leches is that without something sharp to cut through all that creaminess, the cake can get a little monotonous. Luckily my slice was adorned with roasted plums, a welcome addition in both taste and appearance. Their juices pooled on top of the icing, injecting a slight sourness into every fork-full. A more authentic topping might be something like dulce de leche, but this was delicious nonetheless.
So delicious in fact, that the whole affair didn’t last long. After an already impressive culinary experience for my main (for which another review is on the way), I didn’t think I had room for dessert. How wrong I was.
I must finish by thanking Chef Ricky, Darren and the rest of the team at The Harley Café for their wonderful hospitality, and willingness to share the details of their food with me. It’s obvious when a group of people are proud of their work – and so they should be.
Tribudishional score: 9.5/10.
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