creams

To Make Quince Cream

/ Marissa Nicosia / 2 Comments

Since I love cooking with quinces at this time of year, I was eager to prepare this recipe “To Make Quince Cream” as part of my ongoing exploration of Christian Barclay‘s recipe book. In this post about a recipe to preserve quinces that I tried a few years ago, I wax poetic about the floral, fragrant quince as well as early modern and contemporary preserving practices. Instead of focusing on the fruit here, I’m going to consider the “cream.”

Quinces in a bowl

This recipe instructs a cook to stir cooled, cinnamon-infused cream into cooked, mashed, and sweetened quinces. It clearly explains the cooking method, but the recipe is short on measurements. A cook could add as much or as little cream as they preferred depending on their taste and the number of quinces that they were working with. They could also use this recipe to make a cream flavored with pears or wardens (a pear cultivar). In any case, sixteenth-, seventeenth-, and eighteenth-century English and Scottish cooks would have had access to an ample supply of dairy products to prepare creams.

Stephen Schmidt argues that creams specifically united rural and elite celebratory traditions in his post “What, Exactly, Was the Tudor and Stuart Banquet?” He writes that “Fresh fruits, cream, and local iterations of butter-rich cakes were typical treats of outdoor country festivals like May Day, which Robert Herrick frames as an idyll of ‘Cakes and Creame’ in his famed poem ‘Corinna’s Gone a Maying.’ The elite, meanwhile,  enjoyed sophisticated dishes called creams in the lighter, sweeter, generally more delicate second course of dinner, which intermixed savory morsels like roasted songbirds, sauced lobster meat, and prime seasonal vegetables with creams and other sweets like gelatin jellies and fruit tarts.” Due to widespread dairy production, creams might accompany humble or decadent celebrations – with or without spices, fruit, or accompanying cakes. As Ken Albala writes, in The Banquet, “by the mid sixteenth century, cheese and dairy products had become a major item on banquet menus” and English cookbooks regularly included recipes for “dairy-based desserts” such as “trifles, fools, creams, and flummeries” (49). Creams fit into the Concordia discors of the banqueting table by offering a soft, rich, cooling (and, in this case, fruity) contrast to an array of spiced, sweetened, and savory dishes laid out at the same time. (I explore this concept further in my post on “Portugal Eggs.”) There are a number of recipes for “creams” that I’ve tested for this site that encapsulate this trend. Quince cream is a fitting recipe for a celebratory seasonal gathering in late autumn or early winter when the fruit is at its best.

Original Recipe 

Barclay, 155 Quince Cream

To Make Quince Cream
Take & boyll them in fair water
but first let the water boyll, then
[p]ut them in, & being tender boylled
[t]ake them up & peele them, strain
[t]hem & mingle it with fine sugar
[t]hen take some very good & sweet
[c]ream mix all together & make it
of a fit thicknes, or boyll the cream
with a stick of Cinamon, & Let it
stand till it be cold before you put
[i]t to the quince, thus you do wardens
[o]r pears

Updated Recipe

2 small quinces (390g, 13.8oz)
1/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup cream
1 cinnamon stick

Put the whole quinces in a pot. Cover with water. Bring to a boil, then simmer for about 30 minutes or until the quinces are tender when poked with a fork.

While the quinces are cooking, put the cream and cinnamon stick in a pot. Bring to a simmer and then set aside and let cool.

Peel and core the cooked quinces. Mash them in a bowl. Stir in the sugar. Then stir in the cooled, cinnamon-infused cream.

The Results

The quince cream was sweet and floral with a hint of cinnamon. I found it quite rich, but pleasantly flavored. Although I ate it on its own, if I made it again I would serve it with a crunchy “cake” or cookie. My recipes for knotts, jumballs, or little cakes immediately come to mind. Let me know if you try this quince cream with an accompaniment or as part of a banqueting spread. (Let me know if you try it with pears (or wardens) instead of quinces, too!)

I would like to thank Clara Drummond, Heather Froehlich, Christina Riehman-Murphy, and my PSU Abington students for conversations about this manuscript that, in part, lead to me preparing this recipe.

Lemmon Cream

/ Marissa Nicosia / 2 Comments

Luscious lemon cream does not necessarily require “cream.” The gorgeous texture of this lemon cream is the product of eggs, lemon juice, low heat, and gentle stirring. Emulsification creates a delectable, tart, floral pudding.

 

lemon cream
lemon cream

I had the pleasure of testing this recipe using Clark Library lemons with the help of guests at an event earlier this summer. (The same event where we tested The (Rosewater) Ice Cream.) The original recipe is from Margarett Greene’s recipe book (f MS.1980.004), dated 1701, now held in the Clark collections. 

The Recipe

Lemmon Cream.jpg

Lemmon Cream
Take the white of 7 & the Yolke of 3 Egg, beat them very well & put to
them the Peel of one & juice of two Lemmons Stir it Soundly & put
in half a porringer of Rosewater & the like Quantity of fair
water, Sweeten it to your Tast, then Straine it & sett it on the 
Fyre, & keep it Constantly Stirring untill it bee as Thick as
as you desire to have it.

After reading this recipe (and a few recipes for Lemon Cream in other books), I decided to follow a method similar for making Lemon Curd. I also investigated porringers, early modern cups that varied somewhat in volume. Food historian Ken Albala uses 3/4 cup as an approximate porringer measure in one of his accounts of recipe reconstruction and I followed his lead (81).

 

lemon cream
lemon cream
lemon cream

Updated Recipe

7 eggs (7 whites, 3 yolks)
2 lemons (zest 1, juice 2)
¼ c rosewater
¼ c water
½ c sugar

Zest one lemon into a small mixing bowl. (You can also peel the lemon and finely chop the peel.) Add the juice of the lemon that you zested and the juice of a second lemon. Add the rosewater and water. Add the sugar and stir until the sugar dissolves. Transfer the mixture into a saucepan.

Separate seven eggs. In a large bowl, combine seven egg whites and three egg yolks. Add the eggs to the lemon mix. 

Over a low heat, whisk the lemon cream as it thickens for approximately 20 minutes.

Chill before serving.

2019-06-26 14.50.04

lemon cream

The Results

Sharp with lemon, fragrant with rosewater, and just sweetened enough with sugar, this lemon cream delighted Clark Library guests, fellows, and staff alike. Although it does require some attention on the stove and careful egg-separating, its relatively easy to prepare.

When I make this again, I’ll chill it in a prepared graham-cracker crust.

The Ice Cream.

/ Marissa Nicosia / 18 Comments

Elisabeth Hawar wrote her name in the front of her recipe book and dated her collection 1687. She also wrote two addresses in the Shoreditch and Spitalfields East London neighborhoods inside the front cover. These tantalizing biographical and geographical details link her manuscript, now held at UCLA’s William Andrews Clark Library (fMS.1975.003), to the thriving mercantile communities of London’s East End in the aftermath of the Restoration and the Great Fire.

2019-06-29 09.13.42.jpg

When I first saw this book in the reading room, I was equally excited about her recipe for “The Ice Cream.” In the five years that I’ve been testing recipes for this site, I’d never tried a receipt for ice cream even though I experiment with modern ice cream whenever the temperature rises above 85F each summer.

The Recipe

Clark, ice cream 1.jpgClark, ice cream 2.jpg

(37) The Ice Cream./
Take a quart of good Cream sweeten it with
sugar Rosewater or what you please you must have
little tin things which are made on purpose for Ice
cream, first put your Cream into the tin things, do the
cover close on then, & do it up close with butter
about the edge of the cover then take 4 ll [pounds] of ice
lay clean Cloth on the ground & with a hammer
break the Ice in pieces then have some Roach Allom
& bay salt strew this on the Ice beat the Allom small
Then have an earthen pot, put some of the Ice in the
bottom of the pot, then put in the tin things with the
Cream, & lay all the Ice about them that they may
stand fast in the pott, & cover them all over with Ice
then lay the Cloath over the pot which the Ice was
broken on, so set in a Cold celler let it stand one
hour then take it out of the tin panns, put it on silver
plates so serve it up./

The original recipe describes a detailed method for sealing the flavored cream in “tin things” that were especially made for ice cream, breaking the ice and using salt to alter its temperature, and chilling the cream in an “earthen pot” in the cellar. Since the recipe does not describe churning – which radically changes the crystallization of the frozen cream – the texture would have been rather different than the churned, updated version below. If you recreate the recipe using the original method, please let me know how it goes in the comments!

Tasting my updated recipe, below, you might notice that the ice cream has a slightly different texture than some of your favorites. Modern American ice cream falls into two main camps – custard-based (which includes eggs) or cream-based (which is egg-free). This recipe is cream-based and when I was reworking the proportions I used Melissa Clark’s recipe for egg-free ice cream as a guide. (I also may have texture on my mind because I’ve been editing a series on the topic for The Recipes Project with Amanda Herbert.)

Updated Recipe

2 cups heavy cream
1 cup milk
3 T rosewater
3/4 c sugar

Heat cream and milk in a sauce pan. Add sugar and stir until it dissolves. Add rose water.

Put mixture in the refrigerator to chill for approximately 30 minutes, or until the mixture is no longer warm to the touch.

Use ice cream maker according to manufacturer’s specifications. (For my KitchenAid ice cream maker, this involves freezing the bowl for 12+ hours before using and churning the ice cream on “stir” for 20 minutes.)

Put the mixture into a container to chill in the freezer for at least 2 hours.

Let sit at room temperature for 5 minutes before serving.

The Ice Cream.
The Ice Cream.

Results

Subtly flavored with rosewater and sweetened with sugar, this ice cream is simple and refreshing. If you have an ice cream maker and some lead-time, it’s a perfect dessert for a summer gathering.

I was thrilled to share this recipe with participants in the Clark’s “Antique Ice Cream Social” event last month. During the test-tasting, a few participants who expressed a general dislike for rosewater found that this recipe passed muster. It didn’t taste “soapy” or overly perfumed. (You can watch a clip of me talking about ice-cream making here.)

 

To Make Chocklate Cream

/ Marissa Nicosia / 7 Comments

It’s hot out. Each year when swampy summer hits Philly, I start to make a list of recipes that do not require me to turn on the oven. So I was pleasantly surprised when I saw this recipe for “Chocklate Cream” on the Shakespeare’s World Twitter feed in the midst of many delicious tweets associated with the ongoing Recipes Project “What is a Recipe?” virtual conference. It may be 85F today, but this morning I had milk and eggs in the fridge, chocolate and sugar in the cupboard and this mousse-like pudding only required stirring on the stove.

This recipe is from the Folger Shakespeare Library MS v.b.380. The manuscript is associated with Anne Western and was likely compiled and used in the late-seventeenth and early-eighteenth centuries.  The few pages I’ve looked at are loaded with recipe attributions and efficacy notes. This particular recipe is accompanied by two names: “{anne Western” in the margin and the source “Mrs Reaps” at the end. The phrase “(probatumest)” or “it is proven” suggests that the recipe was tested and worked well.

The Recipe

To Make Chocklate Cream

Boyle apint of milk then scrape in a quarter
of apound of Chocklate lett it boyle togeather
then take it off & sweaten itt with fine sugger
then beat up 4 youlks of Eggs with one white
very well & strane it in to your milk, then sett it  {Anne
on a Charcole fire keep itt sterring always one      Western
way tell tis thick, then serve it in Chany Dishes
or gelly Glasses Mrs Reaps (probatumest)

This decadent chocolate concoction sets into a nice pudding or mousse texture in small ramekins, my version of the “Chany”/China dishes or “gelly Glasses” suggested in the original. Expensive and richly flavored, a chocolate dish like this would have been a quite a treat. I’ve also written about early modern chocolate recipes here (with Alyssa) and here (with John Kuhn).

chocklate cream
chocklate cream

Our Recipe

I halved the original proportions and made a batch of 4 generous or 6 slightly smaller servings. I also used a mix of baking chocolate and 80% chocolate (because that’s what I had around) and sweetened the mix to my taste. Add more or less sugar depending on your chocolate selection and your personal sweet tooth.

1 c milk
1/8 lb chocolate (mixed unsweetened baking and 80% dark chocolate, or more to taste) *Revised: Recipe tested with 1/2 lb chocolate*
1/4 c sugar
1 egg
1 egg yolk

Shave or chop your chocolate into small pieces that will easily dissolve in hot milk. (In this heat, chopping worked better than shaving in my kitchen.)

Whisk together your egg yolk and whole egg.

Bring the milk to a boil.

Lower the heat to medium, add the chocolate, and stir. Commit to stirring clockwise or counterclockwise for the entire preparation. The mixture will thicken quickly.

Add your sugar and taste. Add more sugar by the tablespoon or teaspoon to adjust the flavor.

Lower the heat to low and stir in the eggs. Stir until the mixture is consistent and glossy.

Pour into small containers to set and serve (ramekins, bowls, glasses, etc). Allow to cool before eating.

chocklate cream
chocklate cream

The Results

A rich, tasty dessert that I’ll be making again.  It’s exactly the kind of easy, crowd-pleasing dessert that you can prepare in advance. A bit of vanilla or fresh fruit on the side would take this to a whole other level. Let us know what you try.

To make Rashberry Cream

/ Alyssa Connell / 4 Comments

This time of year, I go overboard on buying apples. I’m easily lured into trying anything pumpkin-flavored. (Including, regrettably, a viciously nutmeg-heavy pumpkin pie gelato recently.) But even as I stock up on squash and canned pumpkin and apples and more canned pumpkin, I start to miss berry season. I like to use frozen fruit as a bridge through the winter and, since I moved recently and have been slowly stocking the fridge and freezer, I was looking for a recipe that could use some frozen raspberries I just picked up.

Enter the ever-reliable UPenn Ms. Codex 205, with a recipe “To make Rashberry Cream.” (And yes, this is how I’ve been saying “raspberry” since I found the recipe. I sound like Sean Connery. Or like someone doing a really, really bad impression of Sean Connery.) It’s just what I wanted: easy and with minimal equipment, since I’m still settling into my kitchen, and a quick weeknight dessert. This would be lovely with fresh raspberries but doesn’t suffer from frozen. It’s very close to a fool, the traditional English dessert made by folding stewed fruit into whipped cream. This includes egg and is thoroughly stirred together over heat, ending up with a solid pink color rather than the marbled swirls of a fool, but it’s still basically a mix of sweetened fruit and cream. In fact, the fool probably originated in the sixteenth century, so this “cream” seems like a slightly custard-y relative, an easy dessert then as now, using just a few ingredients.

The Recipe

rashberry

To make Rashberry Cream

Take a Pint of Cream, boil it with Sugar, beat the Whites
of 2 Eggs, & one Yolk, then put to them half a Pint
Currant Juice, a Pint of Rashberry; when it is cold put
the Juice and Eggs to it sweeten it to your Taste, set it
over a slow Fire to thicken keep it stirring, when it
boils take it off, & put it in Glasses or Dishes, let it
cool & strew some Sugar over it ~

img_7104

Our Recipe

1 c. heavy cream
1/4 c. sugar*
1 egg, 1/2 yolk removed
1/4 c. grape juice (or currant juice if you can get it!)
1 c. (1/2 pint) raspberries, fresh or frozen, whole or mashed or pureed or de-seeded, etc.*

Heat the cream and sugar together, stirring frequently, until sugar is dissolved, about 5 mins. Set aside to let cool. Whisk the egg until frothy, then stir in the juice and raspberries. Add this egg and juice mixture to the cream, stirring over low heat until it starts to boil, about 10 mins. Remove from the heat and pour the cream mixture into serving dishes of your choice. Refrigerate until firm to the touch, covering after the cream has cooled. Serve with sugar if you wish.

*Note: Since the recipe doesn’t specify an amount of sugar, I guessed here, and I liked the results. It’s sweet but not overly so. You can also taste the cream mixture and add more sugar to the fruit and egg mixture, as the recipe suggests.

**Note: How to prepare the raspberries wasn’t exactly clear – at first I thought perhaps whole, but upon another reading the syntax of “half a Pint Currant Juice, a Pint of Rashberry” combined with “put the Juice and Eggs to it” suggested that raspberry juice might be called for. Inspired by fools and because I wanted a little texture (and was afraid the mixture might not set with that much liquid), I let the frozen raspberries thaw and then mashed them with a fork. I liked the way this turned out, but you could also puree the raspberries or strain them if you’re not a fan of seeds. Because this ended up setting fairly firmly, like pudding, I think it would be fine with juice. So if you happen to have raspberry juice, then give that a try and let us know how it turns out!

The Results

This recipe was unsurprising – in a good way. I expected it to taste like raspberries and cream, which it did. I didn’t taste grape but think the juice might have brought out some of the richness of the raspberries, as coffee brings out depth of taste in chocolate. It’s a beautiful pink color, and I liked the raspberry bits throughout. It would be tasty served alongside some crunchy cookies for contrast or even with some additional raspberries on top.

img_7106

[My apologies for the iPhone photos. My camera remains at large, somewhere in a stack of boxes.]

Snow cream

/ Marissa Nicosia / 9 Comments

It’s hot. The city of Philadelphia declared an excessive heat warning. Despite my undying love of summer, I’m thinking about snow.

2016-07-07 15.22.22

When Heather Wolfe, Sarah Powell, and I were selecting a recipe to cook with the paleography class at the Folger Shakespeare Library last month, Sarah added this recipe for “Snow cream” from Mary Hookes’s manuscript recipe book V.b.342 to our list. (Check out the Almond Jumballs we made here.) In my heat frenzy yesterday afternoon, I went digging through my email to track down the citation. The manuscript includes entries from circa 1675-1725 and was signed by Mary Hookes in 1680. It begins with an alphabetical index and contains a range of household recipes including perfumes, preserves, and cakes. I have much more work do to on this manuscript, but yesterday I had snow on the brain and decided to give this recipe a try. Rosewater flavored whipped cream? Almonds and strawberries? How could this be anything but delicious?

130843

The Recipe

snow cream

snow cropped, page 2
Snow cream
Take six quarts of cream season itt with Rose-
watter & sugar putt itt in to a pan, & take a whiske
and cutt offe the ends, & shake the whiske, too & ffrow,
in the Pan off cream, till itt rise like snow, then
take offe the snow with a skimer letting the cream
drayne from itt, then putt itt in to a Bason, the
…
bottom off itt being cover’d with currence, or strabarys,
& slis’d Almonds, continew shaking the whisk till
you have enough to ffill the bason, & ever as
you use itt, Take itt offe with the skimer.

Whipped cream makes snowy drift on a base of nuts and summer fruits, such as currants and strawberries. The name “snow” makes this relative of fool, berries and cream, and even strawberry shortcake seem unfamiliar. Recipes for snow are common in seventeenth-century recipe books and usually include both cream and eggs. The Oxford English Dictionary defines snow, as a cookery term, as  “A dish or confection resembling snow in appearance, esp. one made by whipping the white of eggs to a creamy consistency.” Ken Albala’s The Banquet includes examples of “snow” stiffened with rice flour, seasoned with rosewater, and served alongside other sweet and savory dishes. (He also gestures to the role of dairy dishes like snow in the development of ice cream recipes. We promise that when we find an ice cream recipe we’ll make one for you.)

IMG_5016

Our Recipe

I used a hand mixer to whip my cream. This tool, as well as modern dairy processing methods, decreased the need for skimming mentioned in the original recipe. I started with one cup of cream instead of six quarts. The recipe below serves three-four people, six quarts of whipped cream would feed a crowd.

1 cup cream
2T sugar
1/2t rosewater
1 cup strawberries, hulled and chopped
1/4 cup almonds, slivered or roughly chopped

Line a serving dish with the strawberries and almonds.

Put the cream and sugar in a sturdy bowl. Using a hand-held mixer or a large whisk, whip the cream until it holds stiff peaks. Stir in the rosewater.

Add the whipped cream to the serving dish in large dollops.

Serve immediately.

The Results

snow cream
snow cream
snow cream
snow cream

Cool, sweet, and fresh, snow cream was exactly what I wanted to eat. Tufts of cream drenched the berry and nut base. The crunch of the almonds, the floral note from the rosewater, and the tang of the strawberries make for a chilly summer dessert. I could close my eyes and imagine snow.

I’d love to try this with black or red currants (and if you do I hope you will let us know). Feel free to substitute in any fresh berry or sliced fruit. Try a different nut or a mix of seeds. Swap out rosewater for orange blossom water or vanilla. This simple, refreshing dessert is highly adaptable in the modern kitchen.

Stay cool, dear readers, and let us know how  you fix your “Snow cream” this summer.

 

To Make fry’d Cream

/ Alyssa Connell / 13 Comments

Confession: I don’t love rosewater. Or orange flower water. To me they’re like cilantro – I’m just happier without them. And yet, because of this project, flower waters have become a fixture in my baking rotation, flavoring treats like Portugal Cakes and Artificial Potatoes. (Early modern recipes use flower waters when we might more readily use vanilla extract, for instance, which would have been cheaper and more readily available.) So, this time I decided to give myself a little vacation from floral tastes. Something easy, something that didn’t make me sigh and reach for the rosewater again.

I also wanted to check out a recipe book we hadn’t explored yet. It’s easy to play favorites – I’m looking at you, Ms. Codex 1038 – but the Kislak Center’s holdings include many others. I recently spent a pleasant morning going through some of these, including UPenn Ms. Codex 830. Unlike most of the recipe books we’ve cooked from so far, it is identified as the property of one person, Eliz. Kendrick. The title page displays her name, 1723, and a striking calligraphy drawing of a bird.

Eliz Kendrick bird

Kendrick’s book includes a higher than usual concentration of recipes for wines: damson, balm, raisin, elderflower, sage, lemon, gooseberry, birch. I’m not feeling quite adventuresome enough – yet – to turn to winemaking, but my curiosity about the taste of sage wine might eventually win out. Kendrick also includes many recipes for baked good like “Appel flitters [i.e., fritters],” “Biskets Cousins Hobbs way,” and “A Rich Cake,” which calls for 25 eggs. (The “Exelent Cake” on the same page only calls for 20 eggs, in case you’re feeling stingy.) I added a few of these to my to-be-made file but stopped short when I flipped to a recipe “To make fry’d Cream.” Fried cream? SOLD.

The Recipe

fry'd cream image

To Make fry’d Cream

A poynt of cream [th]e yolks of 4 Eggs a glas of wine, Nutmeg and Sugar
Mix them all to goather, Stir it oufer [th]e fier till it is hott [then] take
It of, and putt in thin Slices of bread lett it ly in half an hour
take it out in [th]e wole Slices, whet as much of [th]e Cream upon it
as you Can then it, as it is a frying power the rest of [th]e Cream
Upon it if aney be lost

Our Recipe

[halved from the original]

1 c. heavy cream
2 egg yolks
1/2 c. white wine
1 tbsp. sugar
scant 1/8 tsp. nutmeg
6 slices bread (thicker slices, around 1/2″, will hold together better than thin slices)

Arrange the bread slices in a pie dish or other heatproof vessel, even a rimmed baking sheet. Depending on the size of your vessel, they might overlap, but try not to have more than two layers. Heat all other ingredients over low-med. heat, whisking frequently, just until small bubbles form along the edges of the pan and the mixture is hot to the touch. Pour slowly over the bread slices, trying to distribute the liquid evenly. Press down gently on the bread with a fork to soak each piece; cover loosely with foil or plastic wrap and let sit 30 mins. Flip the slices and press down on them a few times while they’re soaking to make sure each piece is saturated.

Heat a nonstick frying pan or griddle on med. heat. Carefully lift one slice of bread at a time and place it in the pan; once you have fit as many slices as possible, pour a few tablespoons of the soaking liquid over them. Fry for 3-4 mins. on one side, flip over, then fry for 2-3 mins. on the other side, until they’ve picked up some color, like french toast. Serve warm.

The Results

Not surprisingly, fried cream turns out to be like a very rich, slightly boozy, soft french toast. The white wine and high proportion of heavy cream make this a heavy-hitting dish; I’m no lightweight when it comes to rich food, but I managed about half a slice before needing a breather. The main difference between fried cream and french toast is that fried cream has a higher cream-to-egg ratio, producing a softer, wetter result.

It’s unclear when in the day Kendrick and her contemporaries might have eaten this fried cream. We think of french toast as a breakfast/brunch option, and fried cream would certainly work for a decadent brunch, alongside fruit and coffee. Minus the sugar, it would also make a simple dinner with a green salad plus vinaigrette. (Whenever you eat it, I think some acidic accompaniment to cut the richness would be helpful.) I really liked the tangy addition of white wine to the soaking mixture – something a little different from other boozy french toasts made with bourbon or liqueurs like Grand Marnier.

I used sourdough in 1/4″ slices, but these were really too thin to hold together well after soaking; I think the thicker 1/2″ slice would be easier to work with. A denser white or multigrain loaf, even challah, would work well – anything you’d like for french toast.

It would be easy to play with the spices here, adding other flavors to the nutmeg. Cinnamon would work, of course, and ginger in the winter might be nice. You could also infuse the cream with a vanilla bean, cinnamon sticks, or another flavor before adding the other ingredients. Some orange zest would be lovely. And while I have no qualms about heavy cream, substituting milk for maybe half of the cream might lighten things up a bit. Just a bit – the recipe IS called “fry’d Cream,” after all. Light it isn’t.