In this month's Cook's Country, there's a recipe for Blueberry Cream Pie. I tried making it, but ran into some serious trouble with the topping. Here's that part of the recipe.
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TOPPING
8 ounces cream cheese, softened
1 1⁄4 cups (1.75 ounces) sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup heavy cream, chilled
Using stand mixer fitted with whisk attachment, whip cream cheese, sugar, and vanilla on medium-high speed until very smooth, about 2 minutes, scraping down bowl as needed. With mixer running, slowly pour in cream and whip until stiff peaks form, 1 to 3 minutes, scraping down bowl as needed.
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It says to beat until "stiff peaks" form. Well, that must be a joke!
The best I could get was the consistency of thin sour cream—even after popping the mixture into the freezer for a while. I'm an experienced cook, and rarely have trouble getting cream to whip. I think the problem here may be the 1-to-1 ratio of whipping cream to cream cheese.
I searched the Web, and it seems that just about every other recipe for this kind of thing either:
1) Uses a ratio of at least 2-to-1 of whipping cream to cream cheese; or
2) Says to beat the whipping cream BEFORE adding the cream cheese—or else to beat them both separately and then fold them together.
Thankfully, even though the topping is thin, it's still serviceable, so the pie is edible at least.
But does anybody have any insight into what might've gone wrong? No matter how cold I got the mixture, that didn't seem to improve the whipping much. Thanks for any help.
One thing I did want to mention is that I used homemade cream cheese in this recipe, according to this protocol:
https://www.culturesforhealth.com/learn/cheese/homemade-cream-cheese/
But I've made this kind of cream cheese many times before and also strained it for over 12 hours, so I don't think that was the problem.
-------------------------
TOPPING
8 ounces cream cheese, softened
1 1⁄4 cups (1.75 ounces) sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup heavy cream, chilled
Using stand mixer fitted with whisk attachment, whip cream cheese, sugar, and vanilla on medium-high speed until very smooth, about 2 minutes, scraping down bowl as needed. With mixer running, slowly pour in cream and whip until stiff peaks form, 1 to 3 minutes, scraping down bowl as needed.
--------------------------
It says to beat until "stiff peaks" form. Well, that must be a joke!
The best I could get was the consistency of thin sour cream—even after popping the mixture into the freezer for a while. I'm an experienced cook, and rarely have trouble getting cream to whip. I think the problem here may be the 1-to-1 ratio of whipping cream to cream cheese. I searched the Web, and it seems that just about every other recipe for this kind of thing either:
1) Uses a ratio of at least 2-to-1 of whipping cream to cream cheese; or
2) Says to beat the whipping cream BEFORE adding the cream cheese—or else to beat them both separately and then fold them together.
Thankfully, even though the topping is thin, it's still serviceable, so the pie is edible at least.
But does anybody have any insight into what might've gone wrong? No matter how cold I got the mixture, that didn't seem to improve the whipping much. Thanks for any help.One thing I did want to mention is that I used homemade cream cheese in this recipe, according to this protocol:
https://www.culturesforhealth.com/learn/cheese/homemade-cream-cheese/
But I've made this kind of cream cheese many times before and also strained it for over 12 hours, so I don't think that was the problem.
