Leche merengada

One of my goals as an Erasmus student was to try all the typical foods in my two Erasmus cities. My first Erasmus city was Lisbon, and I did not quite meet my goal there, but I more than exceeded it in my second Erasmus city, Barcelona. And one of the things I could not get enough of, was a drink, called ‘leche merengada’. There was a restaurant that was selling it, but I decided to try making it at home, and I had two reasons for that.

The first reason is that making leche merengada at home was much cheaper. You know, being a student somehow equals being broke, and spending five Euros on leche merengada almost every day just was not an option that my wallet approved. The second reason was that the restaurant where I discovered this amazing drink, was situated literally on the other side of the city, and it took me almost an hour to get there. So I asked one of my Spanish friends for the recipe, and I must say the drink was pretty close to the original. So here it is.

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Sweet deliciousness in a cup, also known as leche merengada, which should be on a must-try list for everyone visiting Spain.

What is leche merengada?

Literally translated into English, leche merengada would be ‘meringued milk slushy’, and it is a frozen drink, made with milk, egg whites, cinnamon, sugar and lemon. Sounds almost too simple, doesn’t it? I thought so too, but it took me quite a few tries to perfect the art of making leche merengada by myself.

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The best restaurant where I got leche merengada in Barcelona, is called La Horchateria, and they serve leche merengada in these cute little cups.

Ingredients

With this amount of ingredients, you can make three to four drinks. (I did not say you cannot drink all of them by yourself! ) The total preparation time is twenty five minutes, which seems a lot for a drink, but you will understand once you taste it.

• One litre of milk (you have to use whole milk here)
• 300 grams of white sugar
• Five eggs white
• Lemon zest
• Powdered cinnamon

Preparation

Get a small sized saucepan and turn the heat to medium. Inside, mix together all the milk, 200 grams of sugar (no, do not use all of it), the lemon zest and a tablespoon of cinnamon. Keep stirring all the time, and when the mixture comes to a boil, turn the heat down to low and cook for another six minutes or so, while constantly stirring everything.

After six minutes, turn the heat off and let the mixture cool down. When the mixture is cooling, you can prepare the second part of the recipe. Separate the egg whites from the yolks. You can discard the yolks because you will not need them for leche merengada.

Take a small bowl and pour the egg whites inside along with the remaining sugar. Beat the egg whites until they are stiff and fluffy. If you stab them with a fork, the marks should be clearly visible.

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This is how stiff the egg whites should be for the ultimate leche merengada.

And here comes the tricky part. Take the beaten egg whites and mix them into the milk. This might sound simple, but it is not - the mixture should be well mixed together, and to achieve that, you will need to stir it for quite a long time.

Once the mixture is all done, cover the bowl and freeze it for at least four hours. Before you serve it, mix it with a whisk so you remove any potential lumps.

Serving suggestions

My favourite way to serve leche merengada is with a milk foam and a sprinkle of cinnamon and sugar on top. If you are serving leche merengada to your fancy friends (or you are just feeling extra special and you would like to treat yourself a little), you can stick a cinnamon stick inside.

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A popular way of serving leche merengada is with a cinnamon stick.

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