Tres Leches Cupcakes

Happy Cinco de Mayo everyone! Even though this isn’t a real holiday, I do enjoy having a good taco Tuesday fall on a Cinco de Mayo, and get to enjoy the fun of it. I decided that in addition to having tacos for dinner, we should have a latin-themed dessert, which led me to my favorite one – tres leches cake, but I made it into cupcakes, because duh. So let’s break it down.

For the cupcakes, I literally just used a white cake cake box, to make it super easy. So, bake your favorite white cupcakes, and let them cool. After they cool, do a few things. Take a skewer (I used a metal one that I’ve made kebobs on, in case you were wondering) and poke some holes in it, like 8 or 10 or just go for however many you want. Then, take a small, sharp knife, and cut a small hole out of the top. Then, make this mix:

1 14 ounce can sweetened condensed milk
1 14 ounce can coconut milk
8 ounces half and half

And whisk it together until it’s super blended and creamy. Then, pour some onto every cupcake, and then put it in the fridge. Here’s what mine looked like at this point:

Oh yeah, looking good. I let them hang out in there for like, an hour, and then I brought them back out, and poured a little bit more in them, to try and get maximum soakage. After another hour or so, I brought them out and frosted them. Here’s my frosting recipe:

1 cup butter, softened
3 cups powdered sugar
1/2 cup dulce de leche (I found this in the aisle at Target next to the evaporated milks, FYI)
1 TB vanilla extract
2 TB milk (optional – I didn’t use any, but the recipe called for it)

Beat butter, vanilla, and dulce de leche until creamy. Slowly. about a cup at a time, add powdered sugar, beating well and scraping sides every few minutes. If the frosting is too thick, add milk, one tablespoon at a time. But my consistency and taste was good without the milk, so make sure to just check it. Then, pipe onto cupcakes!

Voila! I think these turned out good, but if there’s something I would do differently, it’s maybe leave it overnight or something, to soak up the milk. It was soaked directly into the holes I had created, but it wasn’t ALL OVER THE CUPCAKE like tres leches usually is. But other than that, this was really good!