Tan Is a Color Too

That’s why the milk cream that saturates today’s Chai Masala Tres Leches Cake is caramel-colored, not white as it is in more conventional varieties.  Black tea mixes with spices, including cinnamon, cardamom and allspice, and the combination in turn infuses sweetened evaporated milk and coconut milk with an ethereal hint of orange, and gives it a subtle tan hue.

The chefs at Mexico’s Masala y Maiz restaurant came up with the idea of steeping tea and spices in the milks and in so doing elevate an already-luscious dessert.  Their variation was reported in Food & Wine‘s August 2018 issue and, ultimately, appears here.  The spices are ground before they go into the milks.  The instructions suggest using either a spice grinder or a molcajete (stone mortar and pestle).  Today’s option was the latter:

More than just pretense motivated the choice, as a molcajete is the best tool for the job, grinding the spices but not quite pulverizing them, thus maximizing their flavor profile.  Besides, the milk mixture is strained before it soaks into the cake, thus allowing for a more generous initial grind.

After the teas steeps and the milk mixture is filtered, it gradually is poured over the punctured yellow cake until the spongy crumb can absorb no more.  It’s then refrigerated, which sets the milks.  This gives the cake an almost unimaginable moistness.  Within minutes of this week’s photo being snapped, each piece had exuded a puddle of milk.  Sweey, creamy, flavorful (and sticky!) milk.

Before the cake is served, it’s topped with a whipped frosting that doubles the creams, both milk and coconut.  Here’s where the recipe misses a beat, as it recommends only a gentle mixing, which makes the frosting rather timid.  Next time, a cold bowl and a vigorous whisking will produce a fluffy whipped cream, and the recipe below has been updated accordingly.  Excel where this blog has failed.

Meanwhile, Tres Leches cake remains a masterpiece, and luscious creaminess saturates it, in fact nearly overwhelms it.  Compliments too, to the chefs at Masala y Maiz, who managed the seemingly impossible feat of improving a classic.  All it took was a litle tea and spices, adding a little color and a lot of flavor.

*****

Chai Masala Tres Leches Cake (*1)

For the cake:

• 2 cups sifted flour
• 1 and 1/2 cups sugar
• 1 tablespoon baking powder
• 1.4 teaspoon salt
• 8 large eggs, brought to room temperature, yolks and whites separated
• 1/2 cup vegetable oil
• 1/4 cup water
• 1 and 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 1 teaspoon cream of tartar

For the tea-infused milk:

• 8 green cardamom pods, cracked open
• 6 allspice berries
• 4 whole star anise
• 2 tablespoons ground ginger
• 2 tablespoons fennel seeds
• 2 cans coconut milk, chilled
• 1 and 1/2 cups milk
• 2 3-inch cinnamon sticks
• 2 tablespoons black tea
• 2 cans sweetened condensed milk

For the frosting:

• 1 and 1/2 cups heavy cream
• 3 tablespoons sugar
• 2 cups fresh strawberry slices

Start by making the cake.  Preheat an oven to 325°.  Spritz a rectangular baking pan with cooking spray.  In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, sugar, baking powder and salt.  In a separate bowl, whisk together egg yolks, oil, water and vanilla.  Set aside both bowls.

Place the egg whites in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the whisk attachment.  Beat at medium speed until a bit foamy, about 30 seconds.  Add cream of tartar and continue at medium speed for another 3 minutes, until stiff peaks form.

Reduce speed to low, and add about a third of the flour mixture.  After just combined, add half the liquid mixture..  After just combined, add the next third of the flour, combine, then add the final half of the liquid.  After that’s incorporated, finish with the final third of the flour mixture.  When folded in, turn off the mixer and pour batter into the baking pan.

Bake for 28 minutes, then cool, in the baking pan, and on a wire rack, for thirty minutes.  Remove the cake from the pan and cool by itself on the rack for another thirty minutes.

While the cake cools, make the tea-infused milk.  Put the cardamom pods, allspice berries and star anise in a medium skillet set over a medium-low flame, stirring often.  When the mixture is fragrant, after about 90 seconds, add the fennel seeds and ground ginger.  Cook, stirring constantly, until the spices just begin to smoke, about 30 seconds.  Transfer spices to a grinder or a molcajete and reduce them to a powder.

Scrape into a small bowl the cream that has risen to the top of the canned coconut milk.  Cover the bowl and put it in the fridge.  Pour the coconut milk that remains into a medium saucepan, and add the milk, spices and the cinnamon sticks.  Place the pan over a medium flame and simmer, stirring frequently, for about five minutes.  Add the tea and cook for another two minutes, until the milk is fragrant.

Pour milk mixture through a strainer and into a large bowl.  Whisk in the evaporated milk.

Place the cake back into the baking pan from which you pulled it earlier.  Using a tool a little thinner than a pencil (*2), perforate the top of the cake with “wells” every inch or so, sinking to about 2/3 the cake’s thickness.

Pour about 1/4 cup of the milk mixture over the cake, giving he liquid time to sink in.  Repeat, taking care to pause between applications, until the cake is saturated and the milk mixture begins to seep up around the cake edges.  It may take only 2/3 or so of the milk to reach this stage.   Cover the baking pan and refrigerate for an hour.

Meanwhile, make the frosting.  Wash and dry the mixer bowl and the whisk attachment and place them in the freezer.  After about 15 minutes, remove the frosted equipment and attach them to the mixer.  Pour the cream into the bowl and start motor at low speed.

Add the coconut cream you stored in the refrigerator earlier, and pour in the sugar.  Continue on low until everything’s incorporated.  gradually increase the motor speed to high, and whisk until the cream is fluffy and comes to firm peaks, about eight minutes..

Remove cake from the refrigerator and frost with mixing bowl contents.  Cut into individual serving sizes, and garnish each with a couple sliced strawberries.

NOTES:

1 – Though the original recipe creates a round two-layer cake, I configured it here to make a single-layer “sheet” cake. Much easier and more approachable this way.

2 – I used a drinking straw.  A wooden spoon handle is a bit too wide.