Thickened Cream
Food · Dairy · Food, Typed Supps
Thirty-six per cent fat, and the thickener is what makes it whip reliably.
Stage by stage
- Fat emulsion (The cream): 36.5 g of milk fat per 100 g, with an added gum or gelatine to stabilise it.
- Small serves (Stomach): A tablespoon is 20 g — 68 calories and 4.7 g of saturated fat.
- Saturated fat (Liver): 23.52 g per 100 g, close to a day’s suggested limit in 100 g.
- Vitamin A (Systemic): 280 mcg per 100 g — fat-soluble vitamins follow the fat.
Timing
Nothing to time. The variable is how often and how much, since a tablespoon and a generous pour differ by a factor of three.
Time to effect
- Per tablespoon: About 68 calories and 4.7 g saturated fat.
- 3–4 weeks: LDL response to a sustained change in saturated fat.
Allergens
Contains: Milk. Derived from what this food is, not from a product label.
Eating patterns
Fits: Vegetarian, Pescatarian, Halal, Kosher, Keto, Gluten-free. Depends on the product: Low-FODMAP.
Satiety
63 on the satiety index, where white bread is 100 — low. Modelled from the Holt et al. (1995) measurements.
Environmental footprint
3.2 kg CO2e and 628 litres of freshwater per kg, matched to "Milk" in Poore & Nemecek (2018), Science 360.
Cost band
Mid — roughly £8 per kg, as a band midpoint rather than a price.
Key nutrients
Nutrition per 100g
- Calories: 340
- Protein: 2g
- Carbohydrate: 2.4g
- of which sugars: 2.4g
- Fat: 36.5g
- of which saturated: 23.5g
- Sodium: 27mg
Food vs. supplement
Cream concentrates the fat-soluble vitamins of milk along with its fat, which is why 100 g of cream carries several times the vitamin A of 100 g of milk. The same partitioning is why skim milk needs it added back.
Kitchen tip
Chill the bowl and the beaters as well as the cream. Fat globules have to be firm to hold air, and warm cream will not whip whatever you do to it.
Common myth
“I use pouring cream instead of thickened — it’s lighter.” In reality: They have similar fat. The difference is an added gelatine or vegetable gum that lets thickened cream whip reliably, and it does not change the nutrition meaningfully. If lighter is the goal, the lever is quantity, or a reduced-fat cream, not the choice between these two.
Recipes that use it
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