For the most part, this line of thinking is ridiculous. But, sometimes, great things come when I create things out of stuff I might throw away. Before you get grossed out, let me explain.
I bought a 4 litre bag of milk and put it in my second fridge when I was cleaning out my main fridge. I forgot I put it there, and proceeded to let my “old brain” tell me that we need more milk. Three days later, I remembered what I had done.
Now, it still had quite a ways to go before the due date, but I panicked because, I knew I would never use all that I had. God forbid, I should throw away a $3.99 bag of milk because of my forgetfulness.
There are many things you can do with milk. I have made home-made cheese sauce and frozen it for when my kids try to convince me that I need to be like every other mother and buy Kraft Dinner. A few months back, I found citric acid and rennet and made my own bocconcini (totally cool). But, I felt like throwing caution to the wind and attempting Dulce de Leche. I have made it the “boiled condensed milk” way, but I wanted to try it from a more natural starting point. Every recipe I found called for whole milk. I had some heavy cream, so I attempted to manipulate what I knew to get a good caramel.
If I had to buy the ingredients to make this, I think I would probably just start off with whole milk and try the whole recipe in the crock pot…I’ll let you know if I try this and post it again…dulce de leche #2!!!
7 cups of 2% milk
1 cup heavy/whipping cream
2 cups sugar
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 cup dry milk powder
1. In a large pot, mix milk, cream, and sugar together. Bring to a boil to dissolve the sugar and then reduce it to the lowest heat you can get; whisk in the baking powder and the dry milk powder.
2. Cook over this low heat setting for about 3 hours. Then transfer to a crock pot and cook on low for another 3 hours. It will turn amber in colour and thicken when ready (remember that it will thicken more as it cools).
3. Place it in jars and keep in the fridge for about a month.