TOCINO DE CIELO (PUDDING MADE WITH EGG YOLKS AND CARAMEL) #recetasenignlés #englishrecipes

Are you ready to prepare a really sweet and nice dessert? Tocino de Cielo, (Pudding made with egg yolks and homemade caramel). It is very simple to make and uses only a few basic ingredients but it is very tasty and rewarding. A literal translation of its name would be “Bacon from Heaven” and you will soon understand why :-)

This dessert was invented in the early part of the 14th century, around 1324, in the city of Jerez de la Frontera, in our province of Cadiz. The wineries of the town used to use egg whites to clarify their wine and so they always had a large number of egg yolks left over. Therefore they decided to donate the leftover egg yolks to the nuns of the Convento de Espíritu Santo de Jerez de la Frontera (Convent of the Holy Spirit of Jerez de la Frontera). Thanks to their divine help and the combination of syrup and a water bath, the tocinillo de cielo was created - hence the reference to the Heavens. The use of only egg yolks gives the Spanish tocino de cielo a distinctive bright yellow color. The dish was made a lot during the start of the 20th century when there was a shortage of food and basic ingredients was all that people had to cook with.

Nowadays it has become a very traditional dessert you can taste and enjoy, not only in Cadiz and Andalusia, but also in many Spanish cities.

                                                     


INGREDIENTS:

For the pudding:
* 12 egg yolks
* 1 egg
* 18 oz (500 grs) white sugar
* 1 cup (250 ml) mineral water

For the caramel (if you don’t have time to prepare it you can buy it at the shops): 
* 3 tbsp (3 cucharadas soperas) white sugar
* 1 tbsp (1 cucharada sopera) water
* Some fresh lemon juice

For decoration:
* Whipped cream

WAY OF COOKING:

* First we are going to preheat the oven to 300ºF (150ºC).

* Then we are going to prepare the home made caramel,  and in a in a small saucepan, we are going to cook the sugar, with the water and the lemon juice over medium-low heat stirring regularly, until it comes to a medium amber color. We will remove from the heat and caramelise our baking mold.  For this recipe, we use a mold about 13 x 9 x 2 inches (33 x 23 x 5 cm).

* And now we are to prepare our pudding. In a small pan we are going to put the sugar and the water and cook it on medium heat for 15 minutes. We are going to remove it from the burner and let it cool down. Now our syrup is ready (we call it Almibar)

* Now we are going to beat the egg and the egg yolks in a bowl and slowly we are going to add the syrup, stirring well, until all ingredients are blended.

* We are going to pour this mix into our pre-caramelised mold, cover it with aluminium foil and bake it in the oven in a water bath (baño maria) for approximately 30 minutes at 300ºF (150ºC).   Check during the cooking time to make sure the water has not evaporated.  Add water to the bath if necessary.

When the Tocino is ready, we will carefully remove it from the oven and let it cool down. Then, once it is cool, we will remove it from the tin mold.

To serve at the table, we are going to cut the Tocino de Cielo in square portions and enjoy! We will serve it on a plate and add whipped cream to it. Really delicious!!

Have a very nice weekend and enjoy it very much, cooking and eating :-)