Cajeta

When my family visited San Antonio earlier this spring, we visited a shop where a guy was selling some Mexican treats, including cajeta, which is a caramel that you often find spread between thin wafers (obleas).  It was when he was telling us about how it is made from goat's milk that it suddenly hit me that I live on a farm that raises dairy goats.  Why not try making cajeta?  And so I did.

I found instructions online and kind of combined a few of the recipes that I found.
You will need:
1 quart (4 c.) goat milk
1 c. sugar
1/2 vanilla bean (I had these! but you can use 1 Tbs. vanilla extract instead)
1/4 tsp. baking soda dissolved in 1 Tbs. water


You mix together the milk, sugar, and vanilla bean in a heavy pot.  Bring it to a simmer over medium-high heat, stirring so sugar dissolves.
Then, take it off the heat and add the dissolved baking soda while stirring.
Next, put it back on medium-high heat and bring it to a simmer.  Cook for about an hour - I had to occasionally take the pot off the burner to keep it from overflowing.  Stir every five minutes so it doesn't burn to the bottom or overflow.
Once it is thick enough to coat the back of your spoon, cook for another 15 minutes, stirring almost constantly until it is the thickness you want.
Take the vanilla bean out before you eat it!


It was kind of amazing that a whole quart of milk turned into this tiny pint of cajeta in the end:

You can put cajeta on ice cream, make those little wafers, which would be a lot of work, or spread it on something mildly sweet like animal crackers, which is what I have been doing...