 Who has the best tres leches cake on YouTube? I tested five of YouTube's most popular recipes to find out. This is part of my bake-out series where I test five popular recipes to learn the best ingredients and methods for classic desserts. So I'll take you through each one, bring from my least favorite to one that I think is best. Let's get into it. The recipes selected for today's video are from Gracious Treats, Natasha's Kitchen, Babish Culinary Universe, Preppy Kitchen, and lastly, Views on the Road. Before we get into the rankings, let's start with what actually goes into making a tres leches cake. The name tres leches comes from the three milks used to soak the cake. They are a combination of sweetened condensed milk, evaporated milk, and a third milk that can vary across recipes. The typical choice is milk or heavy cream. The three milks are poured over a sponge cake that has been thoroughly poked with a fork to allow the mixture to fully soak the cake. The cake soaks up most of the mixture before being topped with whipped cream and berries. Typically, thinly sliced strawberries are used. The result? A perfect melt in your mouth moist cake. Getting into the rankings, let's start with number five from Gracious Treats. This was one of the two recipes that used cake flour instead of all-purpose flour like the rest of the recipes. The cake flour and baking powder are sifted into a whisked egg yolk, sugar, milk, and vanilla mixture. Once a smooth batter is formed, the meringue is gently folded in. This is the only recipe that used cream of tartar in the meringue and based on the results from all of the other recipes, I'd say it's not necessary. This was the only recipe to use a seven-inch square pan, so if you're wanting to make a smaller cake, this is definitely the best option. Once removed from the oven, you'll notice that the cake shrinks quite a bit once it begins to cool. Another thing of note is how much the cake tore when being poked with a fork. I switched to a skewer for needed results. This cake also had a hard time soaking up the milk mixture and I'm not sure if this was due to the structure of the sponge or if there was simply too much liquid for the amount of cake that was made. Once topped with whipped cream and a generous garnish of fresh strawberries, the result is an ultra-moist cake. We found the overall flavor to be a little bland and the texture more spongy than we prefer. Again, you can see how much liquid pooled at the bottom of the pan, so be aware of that. Coming in at number four is views on the road. This was the second recipe to use cake flour instead of all-purpose flour. I did run into an issue with this batter that I didn't encounter with any of the other recipes. When the egg yolks and sugar have been whisked until pale and fluffy, they're immediately added to the dry ingredients. However, all of the other recipes added the milk to the yolk mixture to thin it out and make mixing the wet and dry ingredients together easier. However, this recipe adds the milk later and you can see I really struggled with the crumbly batter. This was the only recipe to use Mexican vanilla, which I think contributed to the fantastic flavor of this cake. Onto this next portion, I do think I made a mistake. I accidentally added all of the meringue at once to the batter instead of adding it gradually. This made it really tough to gently fold in the batter and the result is a funny-looking batter that never quite looked like it came together. Despite my issues with the batter, the cake came out of the oven looking great. This recipe called for allowing the cake to cool for 30 to 60 minutes before pouring the milk mixture over the cake. We did let the cake chill overnight in the refrigerator to really allow it to soak up all of that liquid. Once topped with whipped cream and fresh strawberries, this cake is the perfect representation of this iconic dessert. Again, the flavor of this cake was incredible. The one downside to this recipe was the stodgy bottom layer of the cake and I'm not sure if this was due to the issues I had with the batter or if it's because of the cake flour that was used. We noticed both recipes that used cake flour were our least favorite when it came to texture. In third place is Babish. While we did enjoy this cake, there are a few things with this recipe that made it quite a bit of a challenge. The sponge portion of this cake was great. The batter came together nicely and it came out of the oven pretty much looking perfect. It was the only recipe to use a 10-inch round pan, which is a really odd choice for a Trezleche's cake. This may be because it was supposed to originally be two 10-inch cakes as Babish tried to make a layer cake pretty unsuccessfully. Since we did not need two single layer cakes, I did have the recipe. And I'm not sure if that's what caused the issue on this next part, but let's just say it was my least favorite part of this experience. Unfortunately, this recipe called for making adult Trezleche sauce, which takes over 90 minutes, oh my God. I found that my sauce never got the same dark amber color as the one in the video and it just thickened way too much. I knew it was too thick to Trezle, so I attempted to spread it on the cake, only for it to rip the top and continue getting stickier and thicker. It was simply unusable. We opted to remove it completely as it wasn't necessary and none of the other cakes called for anything even remotely similar. However, once we got rid of the sauce, the rest of the recipe came together seamlessly. While I don't think a round pan fits the aesthetic of a Trezleche's cake, I do think this one looked quite pretty once the strawberries were added on top. In the end, we did enjoy the flavor of this cake, but we found it to be slightly dry and a little stingy with the whipped cream. Second place goes to Natasha's kitchen and let me tell you, we nearly gave this delicious cake the first place. It is so good. We actually went back and forth quite a few times and ultimately gave the second place, but this cake was really simple to make and had all of the classic ingredients and methods of a typical Trezleche's cake. Egg yolks and sugar are whipped until light and fluffy. Milk and vanilla are added before pouring the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients, which consists of all-purpose flour and baking powder. Next, egg whites and sugar are whipped into stiff peaks before being gently folded into the batter. The result is a perfectly airy and smooth batter that is poured into a buttered casserole dish before being baked for 30 to 35 minutes. Typically, a full can of sweetened condensed milk is used for the milk syrup, but this recipe only uses nine ounces, along with the full can of evaporated milk and heavy cream as the third milk. This was also the first recipe I've ever encountered where granulated sugar is used to make whipped cream instead of powdered sugar. In the end, the result is a rich, ultra-moist cake that melts in your mouth. We found it to be a little on the sweet side, which is why Preppy Kitchen gets first place. I was so excited for this result since Preppy Kitchen has been a huge inspiration for me and one of my favorite food bloggers to learn from. For me and my husband, this cake was perfect from start to finish. Every element was simple, no-fuss tasks that came together to make the perfect cake. As always, I enjoyed the thorough and easy-to-follow instructions that you can expect from a Preppy Kitchen recipe, which after all of the recipes I've made, I have learned that how well a recipe is written can make or break your baking experience. The sponge cake was the best looking out of all five with a fluffy and soft texture. It was also the tallest sponge even after shrinking and surprisingly, I really liked how tall it was. That wasn't something I went into expecting to look for. The milk syrup for this recipe was made with sweetened condensed milk, evaporated milk, and whole milk as the third milk, the perfect combo for the sponge that was used in this recipe. One thing I did notice was that this milk syrup was actually poured onto the cake while it was still warm as opposed to cold like the other recipes. And I think this allowed for a really great level of absorption into the sponge compared to other recipes. All of these elements came together to create the perfect cake. It was perfectly light and fluffy and moist. It melted in your mouth. We really couldn't stop eating it. All of these tres leches cakes are excellent. You can't go wrong selecting any of them. It's really gonna come down to your preference and what you're looking for in a dessert. Hopefully you learned a thing or two with me during this video and from that, you can select which cake is right for you. If you like this style of video, please be sure to check out my cheesecake video next. Bye.