Dulce de leche
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Dulce de leche Template:IPA is a traditional candy in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Peru, Uruguay and other parts of South America. It is also popular in Central America and Mexico, where it is known as cajeta, and in Colombia and Venezuela, where it is known as arequipe. The name literally means “milk candy” in Spanish. It is known as manjar blanco (“white delicacy”) in some countries, and as doce de leite in Portuguese. The French preparation confiture de lait is very similar to the spreadable forms of dulce de leche.
Its most basic recipe mixes boiled milk and sugar, although other ingredients may be included to achieve special properties. Dulce de leche may also be prepared with sweetened condensed milk cooked for several hours. Although the transformation that occurs in preparation is often called carmelization, it is actually a form of the Maillard reaction, a chemical reaction that is responsible for many of the flavors of cooked food.
Dulce de leche is used to flavour candies or other sweet foods, such as cakes, cookies (see alfajor) or ice cream, as well as flan. It is also popular spread on toast.
The origins of dulce de leche are unclear, as there are several legends about its creation. The most popular of these involves the 19th century Argentine politician Juan Manuel de Rosas. The story goes that in a winter afternoon at Rosas' house, the maid was making some lechada—a drink made with milk and sugar boiled until it starts to carmelize—and she heard someone knocking at the door. She left the lechada on the stove and went to answer the door; and when she came back, the lechada was burnt and had turned into a brown jam: dulce de leche.
Image:Docedeleite.jpg The most popular dulce de leche brands in Argentina are La Serenísima and Gándara and among the more prestigious are San Ignacio, Chimbote, Poncho Negro, La Salamandra, and Lapataia, which is made in Uruguay. Another outstanding brand in Uruguay is Conaprole.
There are also other Brazilian, Chilean, Venezuelan and Colombian varieties of it, which are solid and can be cut into bars. The Venezuelan variety is made in the city of Coro, in the Northwest of the country, and is sold as either pure dulce de leche or made with chocolate swirled in (dulce de leche con chocolate).
The Mexican cajeta is named after the small wooden boxes it was traditionally packed in. Developed out of a speciality of the town Celaya in the state of Guanajuato, the Mexican version of dulce de leche is made of half goat's milk and half cow's milk.
Recently, dulce de leche has become extremely popular in the United States as a result of the 1997 introduction by Häagen-Dazs of the ice cream flavor by the same name. Its popularity is now only surpassed by Vanilla and Fudge Ripple.Template:Citeneeded
See also
es:Dulce de leche eo:Karamelkremo he:ריבת חלב pt:Doce de leite