Despite the provocative title, this is perfectly family-friendly content. First of all, I love whipped cream. By this, I mean any sweet, fluffy, white creamy topping. From scratch, in the aerosol spray can, CoolWhip--all of it.

But lately, I've been experimenting with the from-scratch variety. And I learned that you can add almost any flavor to whipped cream, but some of it definitely works better than others.

Here is my very unscientific study.

Required items
1) Heavy whipping cream
2) Kitchenaid, hand mixer, or a whisk and raw arm strength
3) Various flavoring agents (see Results section below)

Methodology
Dump about a cup of heavy whipping cream into a bowl. Add various flavors and if necessary, a little sweetening stuff (Torani syrup, brown sugar, white sugar, agave nectar, etc.) Beat until whipped cream forms, tasting as you go along.

Results
Maple Whipped Cream--Winner (A+)
Flavoring agent is pure maple syrup. Absolutely delicious, elegantly simple and sturdy to boot (no separation). As a bonus, no additional sweeteners required.

Orange-Tangerine Whipped Cream--Good Taste (B+)
Flavoring agents are orange-tangerine juice and a little vanilla Torani syrup. Whipped cream that tastes like a creamsicle. Graded at B+ because while it tastes fab, it gets a bit runny after about a day and a half.

Chai Tea Whipped Cream--Nope (D-)
Flavoring agent is sweet/spicy chai tea. A promising concept, but no, no and no. Runny, bitter, and a thoroughly unappetizing color.

Coconut Coffee Whipped Cream--Potential but needs some work (C+)
Flavoring agents are coconut coffee and vanilla Torani syrup. Better color than chai whipped cream, but I need to work on the sweet/coffee balance. Has the potential to be great, I think.

Strawberry-Guava Whipped Cream--Winner (A)
Flavoring agent is strawberry-guava juice concentrate. Lively guava taste, fairly sturdy, and the most beautiful light shade of blush pink as a bonus.

I have also discovered a whole gamut of Torani syrups (passion fruit, hazelnut, peach and raspberry) that will need to be tried out. I wonder what other things might work? Time to find out.

Eat Well. Be Well.

Yes, but only barely. First of all, what is maple sugar? It's maple syrup that's reduced down until it's sugar. It has the consistency of very fine sand (think Kailua beach), about 4x as sweet as 'regular' sugar and definitely has a maple-praline-ish flavor. That's the good part. However, the 2.5 cup container I bought at Whole Foods was, wait for it, a whopping $16! Trader Joe's, Costco, Safeway all did not carry it in my area.

Thus, I'm revisiting the maple sugar-based recipes from last week. Plus I found a much cheaper, totally ono and acceptable compromise to add maple flavor to recipes

Maple ginger spice cake, revisited--Based on the very subtle maple flavor, especially compared to the strong molasses flavor, this recipe needs to be revised to switch out maple sugar for brown sugar. It was good, but not worth using maple sugar.

Maple streusel apple pie--The hit for maple here is in the streusel topping. In this case, a good strong maple flavor for the apple pie. Definitely worth using maple sugar here. Feeding My Ohana worthy, confirmed by my friend Arleen, who was our guinea pig.

Maple whipped cream--Easily the best, simplest, and most economical way to add maple flavor. Pour about a cup of heavy whipping cream with a about 2T of maple syrup, aand let the Kitchenaid or your hand-mixer do its thing until you get perfectly awesome maple whipped cream. Way, way, way cheaper than maple sugar. Totally Feeding My Ohana-worthy.

Watch for new recipes coming this weekend--for the maple streusel apple pie, plus plum sauce chicken, a new roasted chicken and sticky rice w/Portuguese sausage. More easy Hawaii food.