How do you say "crème fraîche" in French?

‘Crème fraîche‘ is a loan word in English – we use it too, to describe cream with a dash of lactic acid bacteria, which sharpens and thickens it. It’s not enough to turn it into ‘sour cream’ proper, so expect crème fraiche (which means ‘fresh cream’) to be milder.

English speakers tend to say ‘fraysh’ which is incorrect. Pronounce ‘fraîche’ like the English word ‘fresh’. Hover over the colored letters for more information. By the way, the circumflex accent (^) over the ‘i’ never makes a difference to pronunciation in French. It indicates that historically the word was spelled with an ‘s’ following the accented letter which has now been made obsolete.

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crème fraîche

krehm fresh