SC - Dulce de leche, the ultimate digest

[ana l. valdes]

Dulde de Leche: I really recommend the people read the archives or
digests before they start a thread that was already discussed on the
list. But for clarifying things, I am going to try here to edit and
resume all thats its has been said, discussed or read about dulce de
leche.
In France, its called "confiture de lait", and its made by the slowly
coction of milk from cows or from lambs, together with brown sugar or
normal sugar. The only thing added is vanilla or some cinammon. In
Belgium they use the same. The same is made in Holland and its from
Holland too, the invention to use cans of sweetened milk come from the
beginning.
In Spain and Portugal "dulce de leche" is not used and barely known,
this is the kind of recipes "it dissapeared" after the Middle Age. But
you can still find in Mallorca and Catalonien old farms in the
countryside that make this dish, called here, "manja blanc".
The "manja blanc" its supposed to be a kind of "blanc mangé. (The
Spaniards says the blancmangé eaten in France or in England was taken
from the original Spanish recipe). There are a lot of blanc mangé
variations, some of them with threads of chickenbreast boiled in
almondsmilk and honey, and thickened with some riceflour, other without
chickenbreats, but only with the almondsmilk and the flour and the
honey.
The recipe come to South America during the Conquest and changed itself
to addapt to the local conditions. In Mexico its called today "manjar"
or "dulce de cajeta", made by goatmilk and sugar. The chickenbreast and
the almonds are gone.
During the Colonial time, the recipe come to Chile and the nuns at the
cloisters made small sweets filled with "manjar" and they made preserves
of milk and sugar.
>From Chile come to Argentina and to Uruguay, typical farmcountries and
the inmigrants from Switzerland start to do the "dulce de leche", since
they have abundant milk and sugar. Today its one of the most prosperous
national industries in Argentina and Uruguay, with a huge national
consume and a growing export rate.
But still, how we call it, "manja", "manjar blanco", or "dulce de leche"
or "dulce de cajeta", it seems to have their origin in an Arabic recipe
taken to Spain during the Arabic domination of Spain.
It was someone who posted to the list the name of this supposed
"original" dish, in Arabic, but I couldn`t find it again.
I posted the recipe, as taken from my grandmothers cookbook and Lady Uta
made it, with great success.
Its a variation with a lot of eggs, called "ambrosia", very popular in
Cuba and Brazil. If someone wants it, I can post the recipe, with a big
warning about cholesterol and livershock.

Regards
Ana

Christine A Seelye-King skrev:
> 
> On Sat, 28 Aug 1999 11:56:19 -0400 Caitlin Cheannlaidir
> <caitlin at phosphor-ink.com> writes:
> > For dulce de leche, the following was recommended...
> > >I've been doing this for years, but dont use a pressure cooker.
> > Just a LARGE pot of simmering water. Place a towel on the bottom of the
> pot. Put your cans of SWEETENED condensed milk on the towel. Fill the pot
> with water. Bring to a simmer and simmer for as long as you have
> > patience. I've done it as short as two hours, or as long as 16.
> >
> > Just as an aside, and what was probably obvious to everyone else...
> > when you open it, let it cool first... and don't stand in line with the
> 
> > hole.  I  got boiling-hot dulce (still liquid, it was only cooking for
> two
> > hours at  that point) all over the floor.... it threw a stream five
> feet long
> > when I pierced the lid.
> > --Caitlin Cheannlaidir
> 
>         I must have missed the first part of this conversation.  It sounds the
> world like you are describing boiling Sweetened Condensed Milk to make
> what my mother called Depression Caramel.  I believe the original recipie
> was on the can from Borden (not by that name, though).  My folks have a
> story of their first apartment in the fall of 1947, and they were making
> Depression Caramel.  They went into the other room and left it, boiling
> the pot dry of water.  The can exploded, and caramel went everywhere.
> When they moved out at the end of the next year, they were still finding
> bits of caramel behind draperies and the like.
>         So, dulce de leche = sweet of milk?  Where does that come from?
> 
>         Trying to catch up,
>         Christianna

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