Slowly heat heavy cream, milk, and sugar in a saucepan over medium heat. Stir to dissolve sugar. Get the mixture hot but Do not boil!

Add the scraped vanilla beans to cream mixture and stir. Drop the empty pod in, too, and let it steep. This will add some extra flavor to your panna cotta

Prepare your serving glasses or cups. You can serve your finished panna cotta in a cup (ex: wine glass), or you can flip it onto a plate after it has set. If you do not want to serve it in a glass or cup, you have to lightly grease the sides and bottom of whatever you are chilling your mixture in. Use a neutral flavored oil, like vegetable oil.

put your gelatin into your cold water to let it soften (about 5min). Remove the vanilla bean pod from hot cream mixture and stir in gelatin until it is completely dissolved

Pour the finished mixture evenly into your cups or glasses. Depending on how large or small you want your portions to be, you can divide this into 4 to 6 servings. I personally do 6 smaller servings, but people usually do a full 1/2 cup serving per person. Obviously, the smaller servings will set up faster

Place your serving cups into the refrigerator and let them set for at least 3 hours.

Once your panna cotta has a kind of "uniform jiggle" it is done. At this point, you can serve it as is, or you can top it with whatever you like! Some examples are: chocolate sauce, caramel, fresh berries, fruit sauce, etc. The possibilities are, literally, endless!