Tres Leches Cake

A tres leches (which translates to “three milks” in Spanish) cake is a sponge cake that contains three different types of milk. Soaking the light cake in a milk mixture for at least an hour is the key to making this extra-moist recipe. This Mexican dessert is basically the original poke cake—whether you’ve never tried it or are looking to perfect this beloved cake at home, follow my recipe to ace this decadent dessert: 

The ingredients for tres leches cake:
— The cake. This cake doesn’t require any out-of-the-ordinary ingredients; you should most likely have all of them on hand. Flour, baking powder, kosher salt, eggs, sugar, vanilla extract, and butter combine to create this moist cake. For the butter, make sure it’s melted and cooled before incorporating into your dry ingredients.
— The filling. Three types of milk come together to create our soaking mixture: sweetened condensed milk, evaporated milk, and whole milk. Some recipes use heavy cream in place of whole milk, but I feel that milk helps balance the already decadent mixture. Plus, I use heavy cream for the topping, so it still makes its way in there.
— The whipped cream. In my opinion, whipped cream is a must-have topping for this cake. Make it with heavy cream and granulated sugar here, or follow my best-ever whipped cream recipe if you’re looking to take this over the top. 

How to make tres leches cake:
At first glance, this cake may seem more advanced than most, but really it’s simple to put together. A classic tres leches is made with a sponge cake. It's much lighter and not as dense as a traditional cake, which is what you want in this milk-soaked cake. The trick is in the egg whites. Be sure to beat them well into stiff peaks and then fold them in, ever so gently, into the cake batter. The goal is to not deflate them while folding so that the cake bakes up nice and tall with lots of lift.

Serving tres leches cake:
Tres leches is best served cold. After pouring in the milk mixture, refrigerate the cake for at least an hour to let all of the milk fully absorb into the cake. Instead of a traditional buttercream frosting, this cake gets topped with a sweetened whipped cream, cinnamon-sugar, and strawberries. It makes for a lighter dessert that is also much easier to frost. 

Make it ahead:
Yes! You can make the cake a day ahead before poking it with holes and storing it tightly wrapped at room temperature. The cake benefits from sitting in the refrigerator to absorb all of the milk; It needs at least 1 hour, but can sit in the fridge overnight before frosting and serving. The longer it sits the more it can absorb, making the cake better and better. 

Storage:
This cake will be good for around 3 days, and is best stored in the refrigerator with a lid or plastic wrap.

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