Cremas: A Haitian Holiday Tradition

When I was growing up, Mami France’s house was always bubbling with activity during the holiday season. Cousins poured out of every room, chasing each other around as kompa played in the background, the music overpowered only by the uproarious laughter of the aunties and uncles gathered around the kitchen island sipping drinks. As a child, I never cared much about Haiti’s culinary traditions around the holidays, cremas among them. But as I grew older, my curiosity turned into a deep appreciation for our edible history.

It wasn’t until my early 20s when I noticed some older cousins gathered in a corner of the kitchen, whispering over a bottle filled with a speckled, creamy liquid. Due to my parents divorcing when I was younger, I spent most of my youth with my mom’s side of the family. As such, there were some pillars to my Haitian coming-of-age story that didn’t come until later, like my first taste of the sweet, spiced, and spiritous concoction known as cremas.

Batched once a year by a dedicated auntie, this family recipe is such a closely guarded secret that we wonder if it will even get passed down in her will. I asked one of my aunties why the recipe is so tightly guarded and she posed this thought: In the same way that a Southern family has a secret cornbread recipe, or an Italian grandma has a secret sauce, we have cremas. For the unfamiliar, think of cremas as Haitian eggnog (sans eggs), though different islands in the Caribbean have their own version of the holiday drink, such as coquito in Puerto Rico. While less well known than its counterparts, cremas is a cornerstone of Black beverage history in the Western hemisphere.

Translating History

The official origin of cremas’ creation is unknown—a story similar to that of many colonized nations trying to find clues in the ashes of a tragic history. While some people believe that the birth of cremas came around the first Haitian Independence Day on January 1, 1804, the creator of the drink and its original recipe may be forever lost in time. But while the history of cremas might have a few holes, the present-day exploration of the drink as it relates to Haitian culture is ongoing.  

“We always got [cremas] directly from Haiti,” says Gregory Gourdet, chef and founder of lauded Haitian restaurant Kann and its basement bar Sousòl in Portland, Oregon. “Relatives would bring it over in recycled clairin bottles and we would save it for special occasions and the holidays.” Emblematic of Haiti, clairin is a style of rum distilled with local cane sugar. The grassy spirit averages around 100 proof and often makes its way into batches of cremas. 

Cremas is a beverage that reflects the value of using ingredients readily on hand to make something delicious, as well as historically and culturally important.

Cremas is a beverage that reflects the value of using ingredients readily on hand to make something delicious, as well as historically and culturally important, explains Gourdet. Shelf-stable condensed and evaporated milks; coconut milk; classic Haitian spices like cinnamon, star anise, nutmeg, and vanilla; lime; and Haitian clairins are some of the foundational ingredients and flavors often found in a bottle of cremas. Variations naturally arise in home recipes, depending on Haitian regionality and personal taste. “I love how household recipes differ, and folks like us have modernized versions that can be dairy- or booze-free,” says Gourdet, who makes a non-dairy version using coconut milk at Kann. Even ready-to-drink versions, like LS Cream Liqueur, have been hitting shelves in recent years as Haitian Americans translate familial flavors to a modern market.

While my own family recipe remains under lock-and-key, my tati Sandra did share with me that one of the secrets to cremas is the citrus. “The active ingredient in cremas is lemon or lime juice used to thicken it,” she says. “How much lemon juice you use makes [cremas] thicker or thinner. And it does get thicker over time, so you don’t want to add too much lemon juice to it.”

Batching Joy

Bertony Faustin, a first-generation Haitian American, is a history-making multi-hyphenate in the beverage industry. He also grew up on cremas. While his parents didn’t drink alcohol throughout the year, his mother would make a special batch of cremas during the holiday season. “I just remember this sweet, creamy deliciousness, and Moms would tease us with a little taste,” says Faustin. “She kept it in the fridge and took nightly shots of it like it was some type of magic elixir … Moms had a sweet tooth, so she always kept her own hidden stash!”

In addition to the traditional beverage, Faustin has also created an array of cremas-infused snacks and desserts at his Oregon winery, Abbey Creek Vineyard, like cremas cheesecake, ice cream, and mini bundt cakes. His playfulness with cremas, and the experimentation with the beverage more broadly, is a reminder that Haitian culture is both complex and joyful. “While Haitian culture has its unfair share of challenges and controversy, it still has a rich, nurturing foundation of community and breaking bread. Cremas is just the sweet creamy cherry on top,” says Faustin.

Haiti is the world’s first freed Black republic, and Haitian beverage history is the beginning of independent Black beverage history in the West. When our beautiful and exploited country was turned into the target of dangerous and insensitive comments on national stages, our shared culinary history—and the liberation that history holds—was also turned into a joke. To celebrate cremas is to celebrate the beginnings of Black people in the Americas and Caribbean writing their own history, free of colonial hands. That history also translates into what we drink when it’s time to lift our glasses.