This easy Tres Leches Chocolate Cake is a wonderful dessert. Perfect for any celebration.
I want to share this Tres Leches Chocolate Cake that I made for my husband’s birthday a month ago. He had been asking for this tres leches cake variation for a while, but I never made or even heard about it before. So, I created it for his birthday and it was a great idea. The result was a moist, rich and absolutely fantastic chocolate cake!
What is Tres Leches Cake?
It’s basically a cake soaked in a mixture made with three kinds of milk. three milk translates to “three milks,”. This cake is usually made with condensed milk, evaporated milk and heavy cream.
It’s a popular dessert in Latin America and the original is made with a vanilla cake. But now days you find many variations of the traditional cake. Some of my tres leches variations are dulce de leche three milks cake, tangerine three milks cake, coffee three milks cake and coconut three milks cake.
This tres leches cake variation is rich, sweet and moist with a wonderful chocolate flavor. It pairs wonderfully with my meringue frosting, but you can use your favorite frosting for this cake if you don’t like mine.
Ingredients to Make this Cake
You’ll find the printable recipe card with exact ingredients amounts and directions below.
Baking powder: Check that your baking powder is fresh.
eggs: I always use cage free eggs for my recipes.
Milk: To make this tres leches cake, you need condensed milk and evaporated milk. If you don’t want to use evaporated milk, replace it with whole milk.
heavy cream: I like to use heavy cream in my three milk mixture.
Flower: Use all purpose flour to make this cake.
cocoa: Use a good quality cocoa powder to make this recipe.
vanilla: I recommend using a good quality vanilla extract for this recipe, because I added to my the cake, three milks mixture and frosting.
Sugar: Granulated sugar for the cake and frosting.
butter: Be sure to use unsalted butter.
Tres Leches Chocolate Cake Recipe
Ingredients
cake
- 2 ½ cups all purpose flour
- ½ teaspoon jumped
- 2 teaspoons baking powder
- 2 cups sugar
- 1 cup cocoa
- 1 cup toilet
- 12 tablespoons butter soft
- 5 big eggs
- ½ teaspoon vanilla
Tres Leches Sauce
- 1 can sweetened condensed milk
- 1 can evaporated milk
- 1 cup heavy cream
- ½ teaspoon vanilla extract
Frosting
- 3 egg whites
- ½ teaspoon cream of tartar
- ¾ cup sugar
- ¼ cup toilet
- ½ teaspoon vanilla extract
instructions
Make the Cake:
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In a bowl whisk together the flour, salt, sugar, cocoa and baking powder.
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In a large bowl beat the eggs with an electric mixer on high speed for 2 minutes, reduce the speed to low. Add the flour mixture, butter, water and vanilla extract and mix for 2 more minutes.
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Pour the batter into the baking dish and bake for 35 to 45 minutes or until a toothpick stuck in the middle comes out clean. Remove cake from the oven and with a fork make holes all over the top of the cake. Set aside to cool for 10 to 15 minutes.
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When the cake is cooling, make the milk sauce, whisk together sweetened condensed milk, evaporated milk, heavy cream and vanilla extract in a mixing bowl.
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Pour the 3 milks sauce over the cake until it is all absorbed. Refrigerate for at least 3 hours or overnight.
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For the frosting, in a small pot mix the water and sugar, over medium high heat, stirring constantly for 5 minutes. Set aside. Beat the egg whites with cream of tartar until stiff peaks are formed. While beating the egg whites, add sugar syrup and continue beating for 5 more minutes. Add vanilla extract and beat 1 more minute. Spread the frosting over the cake.
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Turn on the broil for your oven and place the top rack in the middle.
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Cover cake with meringue. Bake for 2 minutes; or until the meringue is lightly browned. In this step you must be careful because the meringue can burn very quickly. To avoid accidents I do it with the oven door open.
Nutrition
calories: 397kcalCarbohydrates: 72gProtein: 8gfat: elevengSaturated Fat: 6gPolyunsaturated Fat: 1gMonounsaturated Fat: 3gTrans Fat: 0.01gCholesterol: 92mgsodium: 231mgpotassium: 236mgFiber: 3gSugar: 47gVitamin A: 416UIVitamin C: 0.1mgcalcium: 95mgIron: 3mg
More Cake Recipes to Try
Coffee Flavored Cake
Colombian Black Cake
Chocolate and Dulce de Leche Cake
