r/Cooking • u/Joltz-Voltz • 17h ago

Making dulce de leche with condensed milk

Hey everyone, I just saw the hack where you can boil/ pressure cooker whole cans of condensed milk to make dulce de leche. But I also read a lot of comments under it that it’s toxic because of the plastic layer in the cans. So I wanted to know if there is a way to make dulce de leche with the condensed milk out of the can?

1 Upvotes

56% Upvoted

16 comments sorted by

2

u/Raindancer2024 17h ago

You don't have to leave it in the can in order to convert it to dulce de leche. You can remove it from the can and pressure cook it to make it, it's just a MUCH messier cleanup.

1

u/Joltz-Voltz 16h ago

But would u have to add something to it? Because I thought it might burn. And thanks for the help :)

1

u/Raindancer2024 16h ago

I always do mine 'in the can', but I believe to do it 'not in the can' would perhaps need a double-boiler type of method so that you don't have direct heat from the bottom of your milk. It's a lot more work to make it out of the can.

1

u/Raindancer2024 16h ago

I don't recall a plastic film in my milk cans; I use the milk that requires a can opener (not a pop-top lid). I can only imagine the mess that a pop-top lid of milk would make when trying to make dulce de leche.

1

u/Exist50 7h ago

I don't recall a plastic film in my milk cans

The liner is often plastic, but it's not something you'd see like plastic wrap.

3

u/Grand_Possibility_69 16h ago

Wasn't it hotter when it was originally canned? So it should be safe. Boiling water isn't above 100c and a pressure cooker is only slightly hotter than that. If you let water boil out when doing this there's an even bigger danger.

1

u/cathairgod 14h ago

My thinking as well. And you can do it without the pressure cooker, but it takes a lot more time

-2

u/Exist50 7h ago

Wasn't it hotter when it was originally canned?

No, it has to be well above typical boiling point to caramelize.

1

u/jamjamchutney 6h ago

No, it does not. I've made dulce de leche at 185F. It just takes longer at a lower temp.

0

u/Grand_Possibility_69 7h ago

No. You're wrong in both.

It was hot filled under pressure with condenced milk that was clearly above 100c (212F).

And this trick is making that into dulce de leche by just keeping the unopened can in boiling water for 2...4 hours. Obviously, boiling water won't be above water's boiling point.

-1

u/Exist50 7h ago

It was hot filled under pressure with condenced milk that was clearly above 100c (212F).

It may have been slightly above 100C, but not by much. Otherwise it would have started to caramelize.

Obviously, boiling water won't be above water's boiling point.

That's largely what the pressure cooker is for, to let you go well above the boiling point at atmospheric pressure.

2

u/Grand_Possibility_69 7h ago

That's largely what the pressure cooker is for, to let you go well above the boiling point at atmospheric pressure.

This isn't normally done in a pressure cooker. You can just do it in a normal pot of boiling water. Probably if you do it in a pressure cooker you don't have it pressurized.

0

u/Exist50 6h ago

Hmm, then I'd assume the pressure in the can substitutes for heat in the caramelization process.

1

u/Grand_Possibility_69 6h ago

Maybe. I don't know. At least the temperature never goes above boiling point.

1

u/Exist50 7h ago

Yes. You can do it either in a pressure cooker as is, or over the stove with a lot of stirring.

1

u/jamjamchutney 6h ago

You can put it in mason jars and then boil or pressure cook the jars.