Almond milk
Make this elegant dessert in a glass to show off the layers of your efforts (literally). In one swift scoopful, expect sweetly spiced apricot syrup, juicy poached apricots, and smooth and gentle-tasting set mixture of almond and soy milk. The recipe calls for a homemade almond milk, but don’t worry, it’s just some almonds, soy milk and water soaked overnight then blended and strained. If you’re buying the almond milk, make sure it doesn’t have any sugar added - you want the milk part of this dish quite savoury, to contrast with the sweetness of the topping.
Poached apricots with set almond milk. Source: Benito Martin
This elegant dessert could also be called almonds three ways: as a liqueur (amaretto), as a milk, sliced and toasted.
Buttermilk
Source: Sharyn Cairns
Tenderising, a little creaminess, and a gentle tang are the qualities buttermilk brings to the meat-poaching game. A scattering of olive oil, herbs and lemon zest give this simple fish dish restaurant-level appeal.
Buttermilk-poached snapper with spring herbs. Source: Benito Martin
Buttermilk pancakes have been all the rage in recent years, and with good reason: the acid in buttermilk reacts with the baking powder and soda to kick-start a scientific reaction that means loftier pancakes. Peaking eggwhites and folding them through the batter also helps to take these pancakes to new fluffiness levels.
Condensed milk
Buttermilk pancakes with fresh coconut and kaffir lime maple syrup. Source: SBS Food
Necessity is the mother of invention, and one of its offspring is condensed milk, which came into being in the mid-1800s as a pre-refrigeration answer to milk longevity. This Pakistani recipe cooks down condensed milk with cardamon pods, ground cashews and saffron to creates fragrant, exotically-spiced toffees.
Saffron and cashew bal mithai (caramelised cashew sweets with sugar nibs). Source: Murdoch Books / Joanna Yee
To make this taste of Florida in a dish, all you’ll need is some hob nob (or digestive) biscuits and butter for the base, egg yolks, condensed milk and limes for the filing and whipped cream to serve. This version is the perfect balance of sweet and tang.
Coconut milk
Key lime pie. Source: Key Lime Pie (Paul Hollywood City Bakes)
When adding coconut milk to curries (and if you're like us, this is as often as possible), it's added right at the end and not over-heated, to avoid the coconut milk splitting.
Prawn and coconut curry. Source: Bloomsbury / Mike Cooper
Fans of a Splice ice cream, we have a winter version for you.
Dairy milk
Pineapple, lime and coconut delicious. Source: Emma Galloway
Oatmeal cookies are to milk what hot chips are to beer. Here's the classic combo in a mouthful that ramps up the novelty factor.
Oatmeal cookie shots. Source: Alicia Taylor
Curdled and burnt may not sound like the ideal assets for a flan, but they are the desired outcome for this one. Invented by a nun in the Mexican state of Jalisco to provide malnourished orphans with extra calcium, who left the flans in the oven too long one day, but it went down a treat with the children and became the preferred way of cooking them.
Evaporated milk
Jalisco flan (jericalla).
You no longer have to trek to Chinatown for your favourite egg tarts. Considered a legacy of the Portuguese and British, the Cantonese egg tarts differ from their originals with an absence of spice like cinnamon or vanilla, no brulee'ed top, and slightly smoother, less rustic custard.
Dan tat (egg tarts). Source: Murdoch Books
Evaporated milk is thicker and creamier than fresh dairy milk, used to bring these qualities to desserts, like this luxurious but light mango sago pudding.
Long-life milk
Mango sago pudding. Source: Sharyn Cairns
Long-life milk may not have such a long life once you find out you can use it in this retake on a mille-feuille-meets-vanilla-slice.
Milly mess. Source: China Squirrel
Never heard of rasmalai? It's time to get acquainted. This one may not the traditional version, using ricotta in place of paneer, but creates the same effect. Springy balls of baked light cheese soaked in a chilled brew of spiced milk for up to two days.
Rice milk
Cheat's rasmalai. Source: Quadrille
With a full-on lineup of coconut cream, ice cream, booze and donut and chocolate bar topping, this gets some light relief from rice milk.
Kooky coconut rum horchata. Source: Chris Middleton
How do you make a healthy Spanish arroz con leche with chocolate sauce? You use brown rice, unsweetened almond milk, cacao powder, coconut oil, maple syrup and some spices, that's how.
Soy milk
Rice milk pots with raw cacao chocolate sauce. Source: Belén Vázquez Amaro
These cute little jelly treats take all the lovable features of a Vietnamese coffee (coffee and condensed milk) and mixed them around to end up with a soothing, barely set milky jelly with the jolt of a strong, coffee-based syrup.
Soy milk jellies with coffee syrup. Source: Leanne Kitchen and Antony Suvalko
Silken tofu is the answer to your silky, creamy guiltless dessert dreams.
Silken tofu with ginger syrup (tahwa). Source: Alan Benson
READ MORE
Our all-time favourite flans
