Hello and happy weekend!
I’ve been reading a book of short essays on my Kindle app as I commute to work, and it’s the perfect antidote for a sweaty, crowded 5 train. The book is Bite by Bite: Nourishments and Jamborees by Aimee Nezhukumatathil, a poet-essayist-professor whose work is informed by wonder. She and Ross Gay are collaborators and friends, and if you’re familiar with his work, including The Book of Delights, the connection makes sense. The pair could find something poignant to say about a doorknob, or a shoelace, or a burnt piece of toast. (I aspire to that level of wonder.)
In Bite by Bite, Nezhukumatathil addresses a different food in each essay, allowing her mind to wander to whatever it evokes for her. Take the mango, for example. Nezhukumatathil writes that her Indian father and Filipina mother “have argued all [her] life about whose mangoes are the sweetest, the best.” Thus begins an analysis of the Alphonso mango, from India, which she eventually determined to be her favorite, and an examination of her identity.
Anyway, here’s a thing I wrote, inspired by Nezhukumatathil: a short essay about crème fraîche, an ingredient that would surely be in my own table of contents, were I to write a book like Bite by Bite.
On Crème Fraîche
Giorgia taught me how to make crème fraîche. If you combine heavy cream with a small amount of yogurt (or buttermilk) and let it sit at room temperature, it will become creamy and spoonable, with a slight tang. It takes no effort besides sourcing good cream and yogurt, and remembering to put the crème fraîche in the fridge before it over-ferments and turns funky.
The whole process feels implausible, an act of faith.
My brother’s fiancée is a scientist, marrying into a humanities family, and sometimes we ask her to explain why this or that happens. It’s a different language (science) — a critical one, but not one I speak particularly fluently. I know that cooking is a science, that everything I cook is a product of science, but I’ve never understood it that way. My cooking is instinct-driven, and most of the time I couldn’t tell you exactly why something is happening. Is this the best way to do my job? Maybe not, but I cherish my ignorance. Because when something special happens — like heavy cream and yogurt coalescing into a silky, tangy, spoonable thing — it feels like magic.
Giorgia taught me how to make crème fraîche in late June in Rome, where that time of year is decidedly summer and decidedly hot — slicked-in-sweat-upon-lifting-a-finger hot. We were in the first-floor kitchen of the American Academy in Rome, home to the Rome Sustainable Food Project, where I spent six months as an intern in 2023. In the kitchen, there’s a framed portrait hung of Giovanni Bernabei, a regenerative farmer and one of the first (and most beloved) suppliers to the Academy: an altar to beautiful ingredients and those who make beautiful ingredients possible.
The reason for making crème fraîche on this occasion was so that we could serve it with apricot-frangipane tarts for dessert. I don’t know why I decided to make tarts for dessert in late June in Rome. The butter turned soft and warm despite my best efforts to keep it cold for a flaky crust. It was a clumsy affair, all in all, and I thanked Mother Nature for the ingredients I barely touched: the sweet, jammy apricots and the pure, silky crème fraîche, which blanketed the tart and made everything okay.
In Teo’s family, crème fraîche appears around the holidays for a particular appetizer: Belgian endive with crème fraîche and trout roe. The Belgian endive is separated into leaves, pale and bitter-crisp. The crème fraîche is spooned onto the leaves and topped with glimmering trout roe. Lift and eat. (Champagne is also involved.) I thought it was the most elegant thing in the world when I first tasted it in their apartment, the waning light angular and golden.
Last Christmas, I served the endive leaves with crème fraîche and trout roe to my dad’s side of the family on Chicago’s North Shore before our own Fry holiday tradition: beef tenderloin and béarnaise, the classic French sauce with butter, shallot, tarragon, and black pepper. I seasoned the remaining crème fraîche with salt and lemon, swooshed it on a platter, and topped it with roasted carrots and Italian salsa verde as a side dish. (There’s always a place for crème fraîche.)
Here, a list I wrote in my journal of the ways I have used or would like to use crème fraîche:
You know, at the end of the day, crème fraîche is just fermented dairy. As elegant and luxurious and evocative as it is to me, it’s really just dairy gone the right amount off. I can’t help but think that, as long as fermented dairy makes me moony, I’ll be okay. And as long as I feel summoned to write about it, this newsletter is worth writing.
As always, thank you for reading!
Warmly,
Phoebe
I'm reading Aimee's book and as someone who write food-inspired essays, I find it really inspiring too! The way she weaves in information about a certain food and her personal connection to it is skillful and a delight to read. That said, I love this essay. I learned about crème fraîche in a new way! Especially love how you describe the way fermented dairy makes you "moony." Here for essays like these 🙋♀️
Those endives with Creme Fraiche sound absolutely delicious and I cant wait to try them