Used especially in decorating, coating or filling cakes, buttercream is also referred to as butter icing or frosting.
The only difference between butter cream and icing is that cream has a superior mouthfeel while icing is less about the taste and texture.
Buttercream main ingredients is butter, milk, sugar and some extract flavour, which only takes you 5 minutes to prepare.
Ingredients
- 125 g softened butter
- 1 ½ cups of icing sugar
- 2 tablespoons milk
- Extract of choice
- Food colouring (optional)
Preparation
Step 1
In a small bowl, beat the butter with a mixer until as white as possible.
Step 2
Gradually add the icing sugar, milk, then the remaining icing sugar until it all mixes.
Step 3
Add in the flavour and food colour as desired.
Mistakes to avoid when making buttercream
- Adding too much milk – This will make the cream to have a very thin consistency that may be very soupy to work with. Take it slow when adding the liquids
- Using the wrong type of sugar – a frost should be as smooth as possible, you should not taste the sugar particles at all. You can cook down the sugar into a syrup, to get that smooth consistency.
- Using margarine – this definitely alters the flavour and structure of the butter cream. Stick with unsalted butter and use a brand that tastes good to you
- Using cold butter – Take it out of the fridge at least 60 minutes before getting started because cold butter gives a chunky consistency which is hard to work with