Buttermilk Panna Cotta

Pour heavy cream into a medium saucepan. If you are using a vanilla bean instead of extract… Split the vanilla bean open lengthwise and scrape seeds into the heavy cream. Also add the bean to the cream. Add sugar and stir over medium heat to dissolve sugar. Heat cream until small bubbles form around the edges, pressing any clumps of vanilla seeds to break them up. Remove from heat. Cover the pan and allow the mixture to steep 20 minutes. Give the vanilla bean one last scrape to remove all the seeds. Discard the bean.

After 15 minutes of steeping have passed, place 1 tablespoon water in small bowl and sprinkle gelatin over it. Set aside to allow gelatin to soften for 5 minutes. When gelatin has softened (we’re now at 20 minutes total steeping time for the cream) reheat cream briefly and add gelatin to it, stirring to dissolve completely.

Strain the mixture through a sieve into a clean bowl. Add buttermilk, and vanilla extract (if using this instead of the bean.) Stir to combine. Place bowl over an ice water bath, stirring frequently to promote even cooling, about 10 to 15 minutes. Pour into serving bowls and chill 5 hours or overnight.

For serving: Garnish with blueberries and fresh mint.

Technical note – This recipe calls for whole vanilla beans from which the seeds have been scraped. In order to keep the seeds uniformly suspended throughout the panna cotta, you must allow the mixture to cool and thicken before pouring into serving bowls. Omit this step, and the vanilla seeds will descend right through the hot cream mixture to the bottom of your serving vessels. If you use vanilla extract instead of the bean, cooling the panna cotta over an ice water bath for about 5 minutes will be sufficient.