Claire Damon

Quite important, especially in ice cream. There are very few recipes without cream. I certainly put a little less in tarts, but there’s still a little. I don’t put it in sorbets because they’re too acidic. At Des Gâteaux et du Pain, there is a person whose sole job is to make creams. It’s so specialised that it has to be the same person. He’s tasked to make any type of cream.

As an infusion because it’s richer in fat than milk, thus it’s better able to capture the flavours. I used it with verbena, vanilla, meadowsweet, mint, fresh plants or cuttlefish, the result is always better than with milk. When we want to have the taste of the plant, we don’t have much of a choice. We have three methods: cold or made 24 hours in advance. Or started hot then an overnight cold infusion. Or finally, a very quick preparation with cream heated to 80°C, infused for 15-20 mins, then strained. Cream, such as when it’s used in Chantilly whipped cream, is a medium that I find interesting because it has less fat, it’s less enveloping than butter. With fruit, it just makes sense.

In ice cream, for example. I use pasteurised cream because it’s very fine and light in texture, but so fragile. We make the Chantilly cream at the last moment. I have a fond memory of raspberries. When they were picked, my mother took a large spoonful of raw cream, slightly crushed fruit, and added a little sugar, it was to die for. I reproduce it now in my raspberry pie. The tangy raspberries and the cream, without any manipulation, is barely worked. It’s done just enough to no longer be liquid to support these little crushed raspberries on a pastry. The pie is then dotted with small meringues.

I use the same principle for strawberries with orange blossom infused cream and wild strawberries with meadowsweet infused cream. They are so fragile that a pastry cream, while slightly more elastic, will overwhelm them. A single cream gives a rich texture and allows the fruits to come through.

It’s also equally good for fruit creams. I don’t use eggs as I find that once cooked, they add a smell and a taste that alter the delicacy of the fruit. But with just a little butter, cream brings a certain roundness. Without the cream, I find that one loses that fine smoothness and aroma.

It also adds a little something to pastry cream. For example, for millefeuille, it’s 20% lighter with a vanilla whipped cream. This is a very simple pastry that I only want with 2 layers like a Bouchées à la Reine topped with a 3cm layer of vanilla cream. It makes it luxurious and light.

A lot! Not passionately, but it is incredibly important. In baking, it remains one of the fundamentals.

The Cornets de Murat because I’m from Auvergne. It’s a big cat’s tongue shaped pastry rolled into a cone and topped with whipped cream. It’s a little sweet. My mother would add a touch of pastry cream, or Chantilly cream. It’s really a dessert to be made at home as it’s too hard to make in the shop.