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Crème fraîche
Crème fraîche is French cultured cream with 30-40% milkfat, legally defined in France as pasteurized cream packaged within 24 hours; thicker, milder, and more heat-stable than sour cream.
Crêpe
Crêpe: very thin unleavened French pancake of wheat batter (sweet crêpe) or buckwatter galette, from 13th-century Brittany; national dish of France, crêperie culture, Chandeleur, Gavottes, bilig and rozell.
Crisco
Crisco is an American brand of vegetable shortening, cooking oil, and cooking spray, introduced by Procter & Gamble in 1911 as the first shortening made entirely from vegetable oil.
Cristal (wine)
Cristal is Louis Roederer's flagship prestige cuvée Champagne, created in 1876 for Tsar Alexander II in a clear flat-bottomed crystal bottle; vintage-only, from 45 Grand Cru plots, first sold commercially in 1945.
Croatian cuisine
Croatian cuisine (Hrvatska kuhinja) is a highly regional Mediterranean and Central European tradition: olive oil, seafood, and peka roasting on the Adriatic coast; paprika, pork, and štrukli inland.
Croissant
Croissant: crescent-shaped laminated yeast pastry, French descendant of the Austrian kipferl brought to Paris by August Zang (1839); laminated butter dough recipe from 1915; flaky crust, honeycombed crumb.
Cronut
Cronut: trademarked croissant-doughnut hybrid pastry created by Dominique Ansel, launched May 10, 2013 at his SoHo New York bakery; TIME Best Invention 2013, sold only at his bakeries with monthly rotating flavors.
Croque monsieur
Croque-monsieur: Parisian café hot sandwich of ham, Gruyère, and béchamel on pain de mie, first served 1910; topped with a fried egg it becomes the croque-madame.
Croquette
Croquette: small breaded, deep-fried roll of minced meat, fish, potato, or vegetables bound with bechamel; French origin (Massialot 1691), Spanish croqueta, Dutch kroket, Japanese korokke.
Crouton
Crouton (French croûton): small cube of toasted or fried bread used as garnish for salads, especially Caesar, and soups; English word since 1806, from croûte (crust), Latin crusta; also a packaged food market.
Crown Royal
Crown Royal is a blended Canadian whisky created in 1939 by Seagram's Samuel Bronfman for King George VI and Queen Elizabeth's royal tour, sold in a purple bag, now Diageo-owned and made at Gimli, Manitoba.
Cru (wine)
Cru (French, "growth") is a wine term for a terroir, vineyard, or commune and its wine. Meanings differ by region: Burgundy ranks Climats, Champagne communes, Bordeaux châteaux (1855 classification).
Cruller
Cruller: a deep-fried doughnut-family pastry, from Dutch krullen "to curl" (American English, 1805). Two forms exist: twisted yeasted Dutch/German crullers and the ridged French cruller of piped choux pastry; youtiao is the Chinese salted namesake.
Crying in H Mart
Crying in H Mart: A Memoir (H마트에서 울다), Michelle Zauner's 2021 Knopf debut, expands her 2018 New Yorker essay on grieving her Korean mother Chongmi through food and Korean American identity.
Crystal Head Vodka
Crystal Head Vodka: Canadian ultra-premium vodka founded in 2008 by Dan Aykroyd and John Alexander, sold in a skull-shaped bottle. Additive-free expressions Original (corn), Aurora (wheat), Onyx (agave), made in St. John's, Newfoundland, filtered through Herkimer diamonds.
Crystal Pepsi
Crystal Pepsi is PepsiCo's clear, caffeine-free cola launched in the US and Canada in 1992, discontinued in 1994 after $470 million in first-year sales, and revived for limited runs in 2015, 2016, and later.
Cuauhtémoc Moctezuma Brewery
Cervecería Cuauhtémoc Moctezuma, or Heineken México, is a major Mexican brewery founded in Monterrey in 1890, merged with Cervecería Moctezuma in 1985, and owned by Heineken since 2010; it holds about 40% of the Mexican beer market with brands such as Tecate, Dos Equis, and Sol.
Cuban cuisine
Cuban cuisine: a Creole cooking tradition of Taíno, Spanish, African, and Chinese layers, unified by sofrito and mojo criollo; staples include congrí, ropa vieja, lechón asado, and tostones, now shaped by rationing and paladares.
Cuban espresso
Cuban espresso (café cubano, cafecito): small sweet espresso from Cuba in which raw sugar is whipped with the first drops into an espumita foam; base of colada, cortadito, and café con leche, central to Miami ventanita culture.
Cuban sandwich
Cuban sandwich (Cubano, mixto): a pressed sandwich of ham, mojo roast pork, Swiss cheese, pickles, and mustard on Cuban bread. Tampa adds Genoa salami, Miami does not; records place it on Havana menus in the 1800s before Tampa restaurants.
Cuisine
Cuisine: a culture's distinctive, shared pattern of food preparation and flavoring. Covers definitions, evolution since plant and animal domestication, culinary history, archaeology, migration and identity, classification, and 2026 dining trends.
Cuisine of Hawaii
Cuisine of Hawaii: indigenous Hawaiian food (poi, kalua pig, canoe crops) plus local food (plate lunch, loco moco, poke, saimin) from plantation-era immigration, and the 1991 Hawaii Regional Cuisine chef movement.
Cuisine of New England
Cuisine of New England, also called Yankee cooking, is the regional cooking of six northeastern US states, blending English Puritan, Wampanoag, and immigrant traditions with cod, shellfish, baked beans, chowder, and maple syrup.
Cuisine of New York City
The cuisine of New York City, also called New York City cuisine, is a city cuisine shaped by immigration, known for bagels, New York-style pizza, pastrami sandwiches, and street-cart hot dogs.
Cuisine of Provence
Cuisine of Provence: the regional cooking of southeastern France, built on olive oil, garlic, herbs, sun vegetables and fish, with dishes like aïoli, daube, tian and soupe au pistou; distinct from generic Mediterranean cuisine and codified only in the 19th century.
Cuisine of Quebec
Cuisine of Quebec (cuisine québécoise): regional cooking of French-speaking Quebec, rooted in New France, Indigenous and French traditions, with dishes like tourtière, pâté chinois, poutine, and maple desserts, renamed from canadienne-française in the 1980s.
Cuisine of the Midwestern United States
Cuisine of the Midwestern United States: hearty, lightly seasoned regional cooking of 12 north-central states, also called Heartland or breadbasket cuisine, shaped by German, Scandinavian, and Eastern European immigrants and corn, dairy, and meat agriculture, with dishes like deep-dish pizza, Cincinnati chili, and hotdish.
Cuisine of the Southern United States
Cuisine of the Southern United States: the regional cooking of the American South, also called Southern food or soul food. A fusion of Native American, West African, and European foodways, spanning Cajun, Creole, Lowcountry, and barbecue traditions.
Culinary arts
Culinary arts: the discipline of preparing, cooking, and presenting food, spanning technique, food science, nutrition, culture, and aesthetics; historically a vocational trade, now a formal higher-education field with certification bodies and research programs.
Culinary diplomacy
Culinary diplomacy is the use of food and cuisine to foster cross-cultural understanding and improve international relations. It is a soft power tool used by states worldwide.