Shortcut Tres Leches Cake
My mom's favorite cake is tres leches, a butter cake soaked in three kinds of milk. I developed a no-fuss version that’s rich and tender. —Marina Castle Kelley, Canyon Country, California
Ingredients
- 1 package butter recipe golden cake or yellow cake mix (regular size)
- 3 large eggs, room temperature
- 2/3 cup 2% milk
- 1/2 cup butter, softened
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- TOPPING:
- 1 can (14 ounces) sweetened condensed milk
- 1 can (12 ounces) evaporated milk
- 1 cup heavy whipping cream
- WHIPPED CREAM:
- 1 cup heavy whipping cream
- 3 tablespoons confectioners' sugar
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Reviews
OMG!!! This cake was AMAZING!!!! Not too sweet and just the right consistency. It was super easy to make with already at hand ingredients. My husband absolutely LOVED it! I'm definitely going to continue to make this delicious cake for years to come. Thank you for sharing this wonderful recipe! ??
I was invited to a traditional Mexican dinner party this evening, I said I would bring dessert...so I googled “quick and easy Tres Leches Cake recipes” and this is the one I chose...OMG....!!! Perfection...the recipe was simple with very few ingredients, all of which I had in my pantry or fridge...and the result was heaven, sweet but not too sweet, creamy without losing the cake texture and a HUGE HIT at the dinner party, and it got a two thumbs up from my hosts who grew up with this cake being made at holidays and for special occasions in their native Mexico...I highly recommend it!!
Simple and delicious! I love tres leches, and this a fantastic shortcut. Note: It isn’t hard to make whipped cream if you use an electric mixer and a cold bowl. For the love of all that is holy, do not use Cool Whip. If you absolutely have to shortcut, use Reddi whip or another canned whipped cream, which is actually made of cream. Cool Whip isn’t, and does not do justice to the flavors that this cake is supposed to capture.
Very simple to make and tasty. My mother loved it, my children, not so much!
Almost forgot, if you want to make the coolest looking Halloween cake make a Tres Leche tiered cake and top it with frozen raspberries. The raspberries will bleed all over the cake and make it look like the greatest bloody Halloween cake you’ve ever seen!!! Seriously. It’s really cool!!!!!
Best recipe and easy...I made a three layer tres Leches cake with this recipe, only thing different was I separated the egg yolks and egg white to stiffen the cake so that I can stack it. Love it??
This is generally a complicated cake to make... I will use this recipe going forward. My friends love it so much that they keep asking me to make it for their events. Using real whipping cream does not add that much more time to making the cake- cool whip is just artificial weight- don’t short cut and lose the luscious light flavor. I always serve it with fresh berries on top- I pint of fresh raspberries mixed with a teaspoon of sugar is everyone’s favorite!
My mother made this cake every Easter when we were children. When we got older we carried on the tradition. Great cake that kids will love to decorate and eat.
used this for a spanish project, came out kinda janky, it broke when we took it out of the oven but the topping fixed it! tastes great though 8/10. might have failed the project though... (SAD!)
Wow! This turned out so great! I followed the recipe exactly! When I was pouring in the topping I was about half way through and noticed like it might be too much, but I decided to not go with my gut and used all of it and I glad I did. I grew up with tres leches cake and I know it is supposed to be very wet, which is what I love so much about them! I covered it and put it in the fridge over night. Then in the morning was when I made the whipped cream. At first I was using a whisk and it was taking too long so I switched to a hand mixer and after a few minutes I was going to give up because it wasn’t turning into whipped cream. I kept going and eventually got the consistency I wanted. Obviously I had never made whip cream before then. I also used ground cinnamon as a garnish. Finally thank you for creating this and allowing me to have a piece of my childhood that I got to share with people I love.