Surprising workhorse: coffee creamer
We think it’s time to put an underrated workhorse in the spotlight again… And who or what gets the honor this time? Coffee creamer! Yes, you read that right, that stuff you probably don’t even have at home, except when your grandma comes over for coffee. But after reading this, you’ll probably run straight to the store for it.
Because if you’re reading FavorFlav, there’s a good chance you sometimes browse American or English-language food sites too, and occasionally come across the following: evaporated milk. Well, we can reveal that this is our everyday coffee creamer. But when I looked into it a little more deeply, I suddenly saw the light: some of the recipes we share with you here could really benefit from a splash of this humble ingredient!
You can learn to evaporate
First, the explanation we found on the incomparable startpagina.nl: “Condensed milk is concentrated milk. A technique called evaporation is used for this. The milk is heated to approximately 60 degrees C and placed under vacuum. Some of the water in the milk then turns into vapor and can be removed from the milk through condensation (settling on a cold surface and turning back into liquid form). Whole milk produces full-fat condensed milk, while semi-skimmed milk produces semi-skimmed condensed milk, and so on. Condensed milk is also called evaporated milk. Condensed milk is available sweetened and unsweetened and is often packaged in cans. Coffee creamer is also evaporated/condensed milk! So evaporated milk is the unsweetened condensed coffee creamer, because the sweetened condensed coffee creamer is called ‘sweetend condensed milk’ there.”
Using coffee creamer in the kitchen
Now that’s useful. For example, in the ultimate comfort food Mac ‘n’ Cheese. Sometimes you want a little more depth than milk provides, without immediately having to deal with almost half a liter of cream. Enter: coffee creamer. Concentrated, so less liquid and therefore less ‘watery’ than if you used only milk.
Sweet is allowed too
But also if you want to give a shake just a little more creaminess (and you’re working with enough other flavors, such as cocoa or banana, that can pleasantly overpower the taste of coffee creamer)… add a splash of coffee creamer. Sounds gross, but it isn’t.
Loaded everything please
And, naturally related to the Mac ’n’ Cheese mentioned above, don’t forget everything ‘loaded’! Nachos, fries; anything you can think of that you’d like to bury under delicious, stringy, hot melted cheese could from now on be made with a cheese sauce based on coffee creamer. Again: thicker than milk, less intense than cream. So, if you’re finally going to try the recipe for homemade cheese sauce, try replacing some of the cream with coffee creamer as an experiment. And do you feel the result is too thin or too runny? A small teaspoon of Maizena works wonders…
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