On Food and Cooking

(Barry) #1
way to  cream.
Why this confusion of ancient ritual
with rich food? Linguistic accident or
error, perhaps. On the other hand,
anointing oil and butterfat are essentially
the same substance, so perhaps it was
inspiration. In the monastic or farm
kitchens of Normandy, the addition of
cream to other foods may have been
considered not just an enrichment, but a
kind of blessing.
The Italian word for cream, panna, has
been traced back to the Latin pannus, or
“cloth.” This is apparently a homely
allusion to the thin covering that cream
provides for the milk surface.

How Fat Stabilizes Foamed Cream Unlike
the protein foams of egg white, egg yolk, and
milk, the cream foam is stabilized by fat.
Initially, the whisk introduces short-lived air
bubbles into the cream. After the first half-

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