I love making vegan Dulce de Leche at home and you need only one ingredient, a can of condensed coconut milk. I’m using condensed coconut milk from Nature’s Charm. I love this brand and use their products in many of my recipes, from vegan ice cream, vegan Gianduja and vegan Nutella to vegan hot chocolate and vegan rice pudding. Vegan Dulce de Leche tastes a lot like caramel and there are endless options on how to use it: drizzle it over pancakes, vegan ice cream or caramelised fruits, use it in my vegan Snickers, in Banoffee pie, vegan cheesecakes and many other desserts.
I propose here two methods to make vegan Dulce de Leche from a can of condensed coconut milk. The stovetop method requires you to have a large pot and a lot of patience. It takes quite a few hours until the plant based condensed milk transforms into dark caramel, much more than if you used dairy condensed milk. I learned this process from Pies and Tacos where she explains how much time is needed to cook condensed milk to get light or deep caramel and when the consistency changes so that caramel gets so hard that it holds its shape. Dairy Dulce de Leche becomes light caramel after 2.5h of cooking and dark pipeable caramel after 3.5-4h.
I had to experiment further though to find out how much time is needed to cook condensed coconut milk to get the same deep caramel using the stovetop method. It turns out that plant based Dulce de Leche needs 6 hours for light caramel, 8 hours for medium dark caramel and 10 hours for dark caramel. The consistency of plant based Dulce de Leche doesn’t change at all in any of these cooking times, it stays liquid. This is obviously a very long cooking time and not very practical.
The second method is using a pressure cooker. This method shortens the cooking time a lot so it’s a more practical method than the first one. Pies and Tacos explains that dairy Dulce de Leche needs 35 min of cooking with this method to become dark pipeable caramel. Through my experiments I discovered that plant based Dulce de Leche needs 1-2h to get from light to dark caramel which is again always liquid and never becomes pipeable. Because of the shorter cooking time I would recommend following this method.
Use vegan Dulce de Leche in these delicious recipes:
Have you made this recipe? Let me know in the comments below. I would love to hear your feedback.
Homemade Vegan Dulce de Leche (GF)
Ingredients
- 1 can (320g) condensed coconut milk I used Nature's Charm
Instructions
Stovetop method:
- Take one can of condensed coconut milk of your preferable brand. I love Nature's Charm. Look at it closely to see if there are any dents in the can. If you see a dent, don't use this can. If the can is not damaged in any way, then you can proceed. Remove the label on the can if possible.
- Pour water in a large pot and put a sealed can of condensed coconut milk inside, so that it lies on its side. The pot should be big enough so that the can is submerged in water and the water level is about 3-5 cm above the can.
- Cover the pot, put it on the stove and heat it over high heat. When it starts to boil, turn it to low and cook it for 6-10 hours (depending on how dark caramel you want; see Notes).
- During cooking check often if the water level is still 3-5 cm above the can and fill it with fresh water so that it stays there at all times. This step is VERY IMPORTANT because the can can explode if the water level drops below the surface of the can. I usually add new water to the pot every hour, bring it to boil again and then put the heat to low. But this will depend on how deep your pot is. To be really safe, check it more often, especially if you're doing this method for the first time.
- After 6-10 hours of cooking turn the heat off, remove the pot from the hot stove, open the lid but don’t take the can out of the water. Leave it there for a couple of hours until it’s completely cooled down. Do not open the hot can because it can explode the content. After the whole pot of water with the can of vegan Dulce de Leche inside is cooled down, you can take the can out.
- When you open the can, give it a good stir.
Pressure cooker method:
- Take one can of condensed coconut milk of your preferable brand. I love Nature's Charm. Look at it closely to see if there are any dents in the can. If you see a dent, don't use this can. If the can is not damaged in any way, then you can proceed. Remove the label on the can if possible.
- Put a sealed can of condensed coconut milk inside the pressure cooker so that it lies on its side and pour water in to the max capacity of the pressure cooker. The pot should be big enough so that the can is submerged in water and the water level is about 3-5 cm above the can.
- Close the pressure cooker, put it on the stove, set it to faster cooking and heat it over high heat. When it starts to boil, turn it to low and cook it for 1-2h (depending on how dark caramel you want; see Notes). In 2h of cooking the water in the pressure cooker that evaporated should be less than 1 cm, so if you filled the pressure cooker with water 3-5 cm above the can, there shouldn't be a problem with water falling too low. It's VERY IMPORTANT for the water to stay a few cm above the can at all times because the can can explode if the water drops below the level of the can.
- After 1-2h of cooking turn the heat off, remove the pressure cooker from the hot stove and wait for the pressure in the pressure cooker to lessen. I like to manually release the pressure in the cooker immediately after cooking so that the can doesn't cook longer than I would like it to. When the pressure cooker allows it, open the lid but don’t take the can out of the water yet. Leave it there for a couple of hours until it’s completely cooled down. Do not open a hot can because it can explode the content. After the whole pressure cooker with water and the can of vegan Dulce de Leche inside is cooled down, you can take the can out.
- When you open the can, give it a good stir.
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