Rich and thick this caramel sauce has a hint of cinnamon in it. This batch was made in the microwave.

Dulce De Leche is a rich caramel sauce topping for cakes, ice cream, cookies or any type of a dessert, and it’s simply divine! In California we can buy it pre-made. It’s usually near the baking section by the sweetened condensed milk. It’s not something I usually stock in my pantry, but of course at 10:00 pm one evening I wanted to experiment with it, and I wished I had a can stashed away.  Instead of scrapping my idea and waiting to buy a pre-made can of Dulce De Leche, I searched on the internet for a recipe. I was surprised to learn that it’s fairly simple to make, and I had the two main ingredients; sweetened condensed milk, and evaporated milk. I experimented with two different techniques, the stovetop and the microwave. There’s a great guide on About.com, which also includes a third method of caramelizing the condensed milk right in the can. That process takes about four hours, so I crossed that off my must try list pretty quickly.

Both the microwave and stovetop approach still takes patience, so don’t be in a rush. You’ll be beyond pleased with your homemade Dulce De Leche!

Adding cinnamon enhances the flavor. I love the taste it added.

This is where you really have to exercise your patience. Grab a stool, chat on your phone, turn up the music….

You have to be patient – keep stirring!!

pour yourself a glass of wine, and keep stirring!!

This is what your patience creates! Remove the cinnamon sticks and add the vanilla.

Delicious and easy to make!

You should have tasted this a couple of times by now, and I know you want to lick that spatula…no one is watching 🙂

Results of the stovetop method. Each batch makes about 1 1/2 cups.

You can store this for up to a month in your refrigerator, but I doubt it will last that long!

For the stovetop method I doubled the recipe and used the lower sugar condensed milk.  Now my homemade Dulce De Leche is ready for another creation!  I will be sharing the inspiration for this recipe in my next post!

I also added it to my coffee….oh, sweet heaven.