Goat Milk Caramel is better than not baaaaad.

Friends for dinner make dinner better. Caramel desserts also make dinner better

We, my wife and I, are hosting our friends, he is her boss, for dinner.

They are moving overseas for a year. In part to keep their house clean, which I get, and in part to get a bit of something they say they can’t get where they are going, they asked for Mexican food.

Normally Mexican can mean spicy. However, my wife has a serious problem: she can no longer eat any spice and not even bell peppers lest she suffer a bout of acid reflux or something so bad she’s in the fetal position in pain. So, we avoid that. Cumin in: cayenne out.

My strengths are decidedly French and Italian. Mexican food is delicious and I do enjoy cooking it, but I need guidance. Enter Rick Bayless.

I use Authentic Mexican: Regional Cooking from the Heart of Mexico.  There is a new version, below, available, but I used the first edition, and hence, the * indicate the page numbers refer to that volume, not the new one.

In my neck of the PNW, tri-tip is the preferred cut of beef. I split it lengthwise and marinated it a blend of lime juice, oil, cilantro, garlic, onion, cinnamon, cumin, coriander, salt, and pepper.  The blender is a great friend for marinades.  Puree all the ingredients for maximum flavor.

I made a rice dish (pg 263*) and a zucchini dish (pg 273*) from his book, taking some liberties by removing any peppers and some twists of my own in the procedure.

But, the real star and the thing that has me very impressed is the goat milk caramel (293*).

In my experience, caramel starts with butter, sugar, and water, in some version or all of them in the pan. After it turns the right stage of brown, I add cream and let it boil and cool and caramel sauce.

This caramel starts with a quart of goat milk and 1 cup of sugar, a dab of corn syrup, and heat. Bayless writes a trick, which I don’t fully understand at the chemical level, to add some baking soda to the hot mix just as it starts to simmer. The baking soda makes bubbles as expected, and I’m not wholly unfamiliar with this practice as it is used in the pralines, here. Cooking the mix to caramel consistency takes some while. Mine was maybe 35 minutes on the stove.

The real treat is the present goat flavor–not at all burdensome–combined with an unexpected richness to the caramel. I’ve never had a caramel sauce this rich, and I consider myself well versed in caramel sauce. This caramel has totally changed my approach. So much so I want to use the technique with milk or half and half, or, heaven help me, heavy cream.

Rick Bayless Knows More Than You…And Me

Bayless, of course, is no slouch at cooking and no slouch with Mexican food. This caramel is used in a crepes dessert with pecans. If I didn’t know better, this is about as French as one can get. I accept that my own limitations on Mexican food bear more on my assumptions that I find it curiously placed in his book.

The garnish for the dessert is pecans toasted on the stove over low heat in whole butter until it turns brown, bringing the natural hazelnut flavor and smell to the toasting pecans. A depth of flavor well worth making even if you don’t make the crepes and caramel.

The crunch and the sweet and (I added extra salt to my pecans for sweet/salt contrast) and the rich is sublime. And 1 crepe is enough. Some berries accompaniment is a good plan.

We say adios to our friends for a year as they venture onto new wonders which will include filmmaking. There is a bigger purpose to their trip, but that’s not my story to tell.

It is mine to say everyone loved the food and each agreed that the caramel did have a goat cheese hint, but also agreed had I not told them, they likely would not have identified the particular flavor hiding just below.  They also all agreed it was a great evening.

I was able to snag a photo of the last dessert.