Homemade Mascarpone Cheese
Rich and creamy, Homemade Mascarpone Cheese cheese lets you treat yourself to an elegant ingredient without searching high and low to locate it! Plus, it’s much less expensive to make at home.
Have you ever wasted half a day calling numerous grocery stores or driving from market to market to locate just one ingredient? Mascarpone can often be hard to track down, but it’s not difficult to make from scratch! You’ll have this rich, buttery, and tangy ingredient available for all sorts of delicious Mascarpone Recipes!
Why You Must Make
- Until Whole Foods and Fresh Market opened locally, foods like mascarpone cheese were impossible to find in our local grocery stores.
- Making mascarpone from scratch is ridiculously simple, though, and only takes two ingredients and a candy thermometer.
- So besides sharing some yummy recipes utilizing mascarpone, I also will teach you how to whip it up in your own kitchen!
Ingredient Notes
With only two easy-to-find ingredients, making mascarpone at home is often easier than hunting it down.
- Heavy Cream – Pasteurized, not ultra-pasteurized. 36% butterfat.
- Lemon Juice – Freshly squeezed will taste best, but if you’re in a pinch, bottled lemon juice will work.
How to Make
- Bring the cream to a simmer (you don’t want it to boil). Stir in lemon juice.
- With a candy thermometer, monitor the temperature and keep it around 190º F.
- Cook for about 5 minutes, stirring frequently until it thickens.
- Remove from heat and let cool to room temperature.
- Pour through a strainer lined with a double layer of cheesecloth and position over a bowl. Flip cheesecloth over top of the strainer and refrigerate for 8 hours.
- Scrape cheese from the cheesecloth into a storage container and press plastic wrap over the surface.
- Store in the refrigerator for up to a week.
Expert Tips
This Mascarpone Cheese Recipe is easy if you have the right supplies. First, you need an accurate thermometer to make sure you pull the cream mixture off the heat at the proper temperature. Also, hunt down some pasteurized heavy cream. Ultra-pasteurized will work in a pinch, but the results may not be as creamy.
- PRO-Tip: Read the labels and try to track down some pasteurized heavy cream NOT ultra-pasteurized. I find it at Whole Foods. But ultra-pasteurized will work, too, if that’s all you can find.
- PRO-Tip: The process is simple. Pour the cream into a saucepan and cook to 190º F, just to a simmer, not a rolling boil. Use an accurate thermometer for the best results.
- The acid in the lemon juice is crucial for curdling the cream. When the pH of the heavy cream drops, the milk proteins attract each other and become lumps.
- Drain in a cheesecloth-lined strainer and chill and you’ll have 12 ounces of quality mascarpone for little effort and money.
- PRO-Tip: Store covered in an airtight container. Use your homemade mascarpone cheese within 7-10 days.
- If you can’t possibly use all the mascarpone cream, it can be frozen for up to 6 weeks. The quality may not be as quite as good as fresh, but after stirring, it’s perfectly fine to use in recipes.
Frequently Asked Questions
Mascarpone Cheese is an Italian cream cheese that hails from the Lombardy region of Italy. Made with heavy cream, it’s definitely richer than American cream cheese and is featured in dessert recipes like Tiramisu. The addition of mascarpone gives desserts a creamy, luscious texture.
It’s also great on scones, instead of clotted cream, along with a smear of jam! According to the Farmers’ Almanac, mascarpone is described as a buttery, double or triple-cream cheese made from cow’s milk which is ivory-colored, soft, and delicate and can be either nearly liquid or similar to butter in texture. Mascarpone can be substituted for cream cheese in many circumstances, though the flavor is slightly different. But it’s also a little looser in texture than cream cheese.
So if using mascarpone in a cookie recipe, for example, it may need a bit of extra flour to reach the right consistency. You can substitute cream cheese for mascarpone in a pinch, but you must mix in some heavy cream to duplicate the texture. Or you can make it at home with two simple ingredients, pasteurized heavy cream, and lemon juice!
It’s smooth, rich and buttery. Plus, there’s a very subtle sweetness making it perfect to use in dessert recipes.
Besides the Italian classic, Tiramisu, mascarpone cheese can be used in cheesecakes instead of cream cheese, with a little sugar to garnish desserts instead of whipped cream, and loads of other desserts. Mascarpone Cheesecake with Balsamic Strawberries is one of my favorite cheesecake recipes of all time.
I also love a no-bake Mocha Icebox Cake as well as a nontraditional Berry Tiramisu, too. But Italians have savory mascarpone cheese recipes as well, like as a white pizza sauce, in a rich, pasta sauce or as a soup topping.
Unless you’re Italian or watch a lot of Giada DeLaurentis, you may not know the proper way to pronounce mascarpone. So here goes: mahs-kahr-POH-neh(nay). Now you know!!!
You May Also Like:
Here are some delicious recipes using mascarpone cheese plus it would be a scrumptious spread on this yummy Brown Sugar Bread!
- Mascarpone Filled Strawberries
- Individual Tiramisu Parfaits
- Balsamic Raspberries with Mascarpone
- Chocolate Mascarpone Cheesecake
- Mascarpone Topped Poached Apples
- More Best Dessert Recipes
Homemade Mascarpone Cheese Recipe
A simple recipe to make mascarpone cheese at home. Adapted from Pastry Affair.
Ingredients
- 2 cups heavy cream (pasteurized, not ultra-pasteurized)
- 1 tablespoon freshly squeezed lemon juice
Instructions
- Pour cream into a large saucepan and heat to a simmer (you don't want it to boil). Stir in lemon juice. With a candy thermometer, monitor the temperature and keep it around 190º F.
- Cook for about 5 minutes, stirring frequently with a rubber spatula, till the mixture thickens.
- Remove from heat and let cool to room temperature.
- Pour through a strainer lined with a double layer of cheesecloth and positioned over a bowl. Flip cheesecloth over top of the strainer and refrigerate for 8 hours.
- Scrape cheese from the cheesecloth into a storage container and press plastic wrap over the surface.
- Store for up to a week.
Notes
Pasteurized not Ultra-Pasteurized Heavy Cream is preferred, but both will work.
Recommended Products
As an Amazon Associate and member of other affiliate programs, I earn from qualifying purchases.
Nutrition Information:
Yield:
24Serving Size:
1 tablespoonAmount Per Serving: Calories: 68Total Fat: 7gSaturated Fat: 5gTrans Fat: 0gUnsaturated Fat: 2gCholesterol: 22mgSodium: 6mgCarbohydrates: 1gFiber: 0gSugar: 1gProtein: 1g
82 Comments on “Homemade Mascarpone Cheese”
Hello, I’ve been using this recipe for a few years now for my homemade tiramisu. I have a question about doubling or quadrupling the batch. Should I use the same amount of lemon if I quadruple the recipe? As in 4 tablespoons? I want to use one big pot instead of do it 4 times. Thank you for this recipe it’s amazing and so easy!
Hi, Jess, I would quadruple all the ingredients so that there’s enough acid to curdle all the cream. I haven’t tested this, but that’s my first instinct. Please report back, as I’d love to put a note in the recipe that it can be quadrupled successfully. Fingers crossed for you and I’m delighted that you love this recipe! Liz
This is such an amazing recipe! I love that you can easily make it at home!
This turned out so beautifully, love that I can make it at home.
I’m an amateur cook. Want to be certain…is the product that u scrape off of cheese cloth (to be stored under the flipped cheese cloth ) the mascarpone or is it the liquid in the bottom of bowl that has been separated that becomes the mascarpone? Seems simple but I confuse easily when dealing with foreign concepts! If mascarpone is the “cheese” product, what can u use the remaining separated cream for? I hate to waste! I’m mainly using mascarpone for fresh fruit toppings home made ice cream ingredients, pie toppings.
Hi, Cher! Keep what is in the cheesecloth. The liquid drained can be discarded, it’s whey. I usually toss it, but here are some ideas for how to use it (I think in smoothies or to cook potatoes, etc. sound best!):
Reconstitute fruit juice to add nutritional value.
Use it as a starter culture when fermenting vegetables.
Make whey lemonade.
Add it to smoothies and shakes to provide more vitamins, minerals, and proteins.
Use as cooking liquid for potatoes, rice, grits, pasta, and grains.
Drink it straight!
Great question. Hope you enjoy your mascarpone.
We’ve been watching The British Bakery Show and they use mascarpone quite often. I didn’t realize it was so easy to make at home. Thanks for sharing this.
Finding pasteurized heavy cream is harder than finding mascarpone in my area. I like the idea of making your own though when you need a good quantity of it as it is very expensive to buy. Thanks for sharing how you made it.
What a great post! We use mascarpone quite a lot of our baking. Luckily, we have it pretty readily available. Even so, it’d be fun to make — have never done that. Looks easy, too, and I bet freshly made has wonderful flavor. Thanks!
Sooo great to make it yourself, Liz! I need to try your recipe, it’s so simple! Mascarpone can really be tough to track down!
Mascarpone cheese is hard to find for sure, and like you said, Fresh Market. Sounds easy enough to make, thanks for the recipe!
Oh yeah, mascarpone is something you cannot always find in our stories too! That happened with me back in February, when I really needed it, but nope. So I ended up making my own mascarpone that I had wanted to try for a long time! It was so much better that any store-bought, and needless to say it’s significantly cheaper! As we heading into the summer, i will be making homemade mascarpone for easy no bake desserts quite often!
Oh yeah, mascarpone is something you cannot always find in our stories too. That happened to me back in February, when I really needed it – but nope. So I ended up making my own mascarpone that I had wanted to try for a long time! It was so much better than any store-bought, and needless to say it’s significantly cheaper. As we heading into the summer, i will be making homemade mascarpone for easy no bake desserts quite often!
I haven’t made mascarpone in ages! And you’re so right, it’s very easy to make. Can’t wait to see the luscious dessert you use it in.
Is it 190 Fahrenheit or celsius
Hi, Silvina,
It’s Fahrenheit. I’ll update the recipe. Thank you!