Crème fraîche is a cultured dairy product that tastes like a gentler, creamier sour cream, thanks to its significantly higher fat content. This European product is made by adding a bacterial culture to double cream (what we call heavy cream in the U.S.). More fat doesn’t just translate to a richer flavor, it prevents the dairy from curdling when exposed to heat, the same way heavy cream curdles less readily than whole milk. It’s a bit of a wonder ingredient. It adds creamy, tangy flavor and body all at once, and can be cooked into dishes or dolloped on top as a finishing touch.

The secret to better baking

It’s the star of some of our favorite baked goods. Instead of the usual heavy cream or canned milk, our Pumpkin Pie with Honey-Orange Whipped Cream contains 8 ounces of crème fraîche, balancing the sweetness of the filling with a subtle but distinct tanginess. We have a tart version of that pie as well.

Another tart boosted by crème fraîche is our French Walnut Tart, our take on pecan pie. The crème fraîche cuts through the cloying sweetness of what is usually a very rich, sugar- and butter-heavy confection. This tart is made with a whole-wheat tart shell, which has a nutty complexity that further offsets the sweetness.

Crème fraîche is great for adding a more balanced richness to desserts. We have a Chèvre Cheesecake with Black Pepper–Graham Crust that is packed with tons of goat cheese, cream cheese and, of course, crème fraîche. This cheesecake boasts a more adult flavor profile than the standard New York-style cheesecake. With savory-tart goat cheese and a black pepper-speckled crust, it elevates cheesecake into a special occasion dessert.

If you’re looking for something lighter this holiday season, we have a Frozen Lemon Mousse that utilizes crème fraîche to complement the acidity in the lemon while rounding out the flavors with a pronounced creaminess. Similarly, we use crème fraîche in several ice cream recipes; the extra fat keeps things creamy instead of icy.

Use it to boost your savory dishes

These Mashed Sweet Potatoes with aleppo pepper use crème fraîche instead of milk or heavy cream. It gives the sweet potatoes a subtle, tangy note that balances the sweeter flavors. Aleppo pepper adds a fruity and mildly spicy flavor—it’s worth seeking out. If you have crème fraîche leftover from making these potatoes, I also love using it in regular mashed potatoes. We don’t have a recipe for this, but try adding some to taste— or serve it atop a baked potato like you would sour cream.

A helpful tip I learned from our Education Director, Rosie Gill is to think of ingredients as adjectives, not nouns. Rosie says, “it’s not what they are, it’s what they do.” Though it is itself a dairy product, crème fraîche is excellent for providing contrasting tartness to cheesy dishes, like our Romanian Baked Polenta.

In dishes like our Porcini-Seasoned Steak au Poivre and Crème Fraîche Chicken Fricassée, we use crème fraîche to thicken and flavor pan juices to make a velvety sauce. It’s especially well-suited to this task, as it adds body and tangy flavor, without breaking and separating under high heat. It also can be added at the end of cooking, to boost the richness of a sauce and balance the savory flavors, like it does in this mussels dish.

Make holiday breakfasts special

I’m always looking for ways to improve the big holiday breakfasts I make during “hosting season.” The secret to our Deep-Dish Quiche with Mushrooms, Bacon and Gruyère is using crème fraîche instead of heavy cream. It adds richness like that of heavy cream, but with less liquid. The result is a tall quiche with a light texture. I’ve also had great success whisking it into my eggs for a lighter, fluffier scramble.

If you’re looking for a sweeter breakfast treat, our Sugared Crème Fraîche Brioche Buns (Galettes Bressane) can be mixed, shaped and baked in just a few hours. The crème fraîche thickens in the oven and creates an almost cheese danish-like filling, nestled in soft, tender brioche. And in Romania, we learned Romanian Crème Fraîche Cake (Lichiu) that starts with a brioche-like base layer and is topped with a crème fraîche-infused, cheesecake-y filling. It’s more of a snacking cake, but during the holidays it might as well be an indulgent breakfast treat.

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Willow Montana

Willow Montana is the Production Manager of Digital Media at Milk Street. Willow spends their days coordinating and planning video shoots, managing schedules and overseeing the execution of digital projects. They studied Baking and Pastry Arts at Johnson and Wales University and worked in restaurants while putting themself through six more years of college. They hold a Bachelor’s of Fine Arts in English Literature and a Master’s of Fine Arts in Publishing and Writing. Willow is a firm believer in living a slow, quiet life and making things by hand. When they aren’t following the developers around with a camera at the Milk Street office, they may be found at home shaping loaves of sourdough, caring for dozens of houseplants and, occasionally, out in the wild at a punk rock show.