Cinco Leches (Tres Leches all grown up) #TheCakeSliceBakers

April 20, 2022

Cinco Leches (Tres Leches all grown up) #TheCakeSliceBakers

I remember watching the Warren Beatty Dick Tracy movie as a little kid (sheesh, TOTALLY aging myself!). I don't remember a lot about it, except a Marilyn Monroe-esque lady (I think it was Madonna, actually 😬) singing a song about the joys of excess (money, jewels...and the crazy prosthetic makeup on Al Pacino's villain in the show) with the chorus, "If you have two, you might as well have four. And if you like four why not a few, why not a slew moooooorrrre!"

Mooooooorrrre!

The same logic applies to this tres leches cake. The author of Zoe Bakes cakes asks the question, "If three milks are good, why not five?"

And she is correct.

Forget less is more. MORE is more. Or, err...más es más.

Enter the Cinco Leches Cake.

If you've never had a slice of this popular Latin American cake, it's sweet. And it's VERY moist. And delicious. Apparently it became popular in the 1940s, when the recipe was printed on the label of Nestle's sweetened condensed milk.

The three milks mentioned in the traditional cake's name are whipped cream, sweetened condensed milk, and evaporated milk (although, according to Wikipedia it's become popular in Albania--and they've taken a more literal approach with cow's, goat's, and water buffalo's milk. I'll take the South/Central American version, please!)

Zoe's cake incorporates two more dairy products: regular milk and sour cream. The sour cream gives the lightly-sweetened whipped cream a slight tang that really makes it sing.

And her inclusion of cinnamon makes the whole thing reminiscent of another Latin American gift to the world: horchata. Yum.

So go ahead. Be naughty. Be more-ish. You only live once. Give this Cinco Leches cake a try--it's worth every calorie!

Each month The Cake Slice Bakers are offered a selection of cakes from the current book we are baking through. This year it is Zoë Bakes Cakes by Zoē François. We each choose one cake to bake, and then on the 20th - never before - we all post about our cake on our blogs. There are a few rules that we follow, but the most important ones are to have fun and enjoy baking & eating cakes!

Follow our Facebook, Instagram, and Pinterest pages where you can find all of our cakes, as well as inspiration for many other cakes. You can also click on the links below to take you to each of our cakes. If you have a blog and are interested in joining The Cake Slice Bakers and baking along with us, please send an email to thecakeslicebakers at gmail dot com for more details.

The Cake Slice Bakers also have a new Facebook group called The Cake Slice Bakers and Friends. This group is perfect for those who do not have a blog but want to join in the fun and bake through this book.