🥫 Condensed milk

Sweetened condensed milk is a canned dairy product: part of the water is evaporated from milk and sugar is added. Directive 2001/114/EC and FDA rules in the United States both require it to contain at least 8% fat and 28% milk solids. Skimmed and partly skimmed kinds have from 24% milk solids. ¹²

At the plant, the milk is standardised for fat, heated to 100–120 °C for 1–3 minutes and evaporated under vacuum at 65–70 °C ³. The raw material can also be milk recombined from milk powder, fat and water ³. Enough sugar is added to reach 62.5–64.5% in the water phase: less risks microbial growth, more makes the sugar crystallise and the product turn sandy ³.

This solution has low water activity (about 0.78) and high osmotic pressure, so the product preserves itself ³. It contains more lactose than the water can dissolve, and about 75% of it crystallises. So the mass is cooled quickly and fine lactose crystals are added as seed: crystals up to 10 μm are not felt on the tongue ³.

Unsweetened condensed milk, or evaporated milk, is sterilised: it is light in colour and looks like cream, and heat, not sugar, preserves it ³.

The idea of preserving milk with sugar took shape in the United States around 1850. In 1856 Gail Borden received US patent No. 15,553 for condensing milk in a vacuum, and unsweetened condensed milk began to be sterilised in cans from the 1880s. According to FAO, most of the world's condensed milk is sweetened; in Latin America it often replaces jam in baking, and milk boiled down with sugar became dulce de leche there. ³⁴⁶

Condensed milk or evaporated milk? Both are milk with part of the water removed, but they are preserved differently: the sweetened kind by sugar, the unsweetened kind by sterilising heat. Evaporated milk is lighter in colour and looks like cream. People also ask about dulce de leche: that is milk boiled down with sugar, a Latin American tradition, whereas the canned product is made in a vacuum evaporator at 65–70 °C. Neither is a substitute for fresh milk in a baby's diet.

Look for “sweetened condensed milk” on the tin; “evaporated milk” is the unsweetened kind. Both names are defined by the EU Directive 2001/114/EC, and US cans follow the FDA standard. Check the ingredients: milk and sugar are expected, but the US standard also allows other nutritive sweeteners. You will find tins in the baking aisle of a supermarket, usually near the milk powder, and in the baking or world-food sections of larger stores.

Why it matters to you. According to USDA, 100 g of sweetened condensed milk has 321 kcal, 54 g of carbohydrate (mostly sugars), 7.9 g of protein, 8.7 g of fat and 284 mg of calcium ⁵. It is a sweet ingredient, not a milk substitute: the NHS says never to give condensed milk to babies under 1 year ⁷. Look for milk and sugar on the label: the US standard also allows other nutritive sweeteners, so read the ingredients ².