I love buttercream and those who have tasted the cake I have made usually say that the buttercream I have made is tastier than the ones they have tasted from a bakery. In bakery they use shortening instead of butter in making buttercream, so the taste differs a lot. I have seen recipes using both butter and shortening/ vanaspathi. But I never add shortening in the buttercream. Do you remember the rose cake I made recently? I decorated it with vanilla buttercream. When I finished working with the buttercream, my daughter finishes what is left in the bowl just like that. She is so so fond of that. The texture of the buttercream depends on how much you beat the butter sugar mixture. The more you beat, the softer and fluffier the buttercream. Use a hand mixer or a stand mixer instead of a wooden spatula for beating. This makes the work easier.
There are three consistencies used in cake decoration. Thinner butter cream is used for crumb coating and piping out letters. Medium consistency is used for piping out roses and flowers. Thicker butter cream is used for frosting the cake. To make different consistencies in butter cream adjust the amount of milk added. For 1 cup of butter you will need 4 cups of icing sugar. Do not use sugar powdered in your mixer grinder because it will be coarser and the butter cream will not be smooth. So use either icing sugar or powdered sugar available in Nilgiris. Both works fine.
Beat butter until soft and fluffy. The colour of butter will become paler with beating.
Add a cup of icing sugar and beat until fully incorporated.
Keep on adding all the sugar and beat until fully incorporated. The cream will be very thick now.
Add 2 tbs of milk and a teaspoon of vanilla essenceand beat for a minute. Beat continuosly after adding milk. This is the stage at which you decide the consistency of your buttercream.
Keep on beating until peaks form. I just love the look of the buttercream at this stage.
Next add the colour you have chosen. Add the colour in drops. Always you can add more but will neer be able to reverse it. So be careful while adding colours. Liquid colours or gel colours are best suited for colouring. If you are using powdered colour, then add a little warm water to the powder. Make sure it is completely dissolved. Then add the required colour to the cream. If you add powder directly to the cream, you will end up with irregular shades and dots in the final cream. I learned it the hard way. So do not make that mistake. Your butter cream is ready for frosting.
Can you pls tell me which make of butter you use?
I had also tried to make this icing by using nutralite butter but the whole icing did not get combined it looked separated
Nutralite is actually not butter. So it won’t work. Use any unsalted butter available at your place. I use Nilgiris / Hatsun.
Thanks a lot fr d detailed recipe….Ur all dishes r awesome
I used 2 cups of butter and 1 cup of sugar it is very light , which consistency you refer for buttercream frosting. You said 1:4 is this very sweet?
The ratio is completely wrong. Sugar must be more than the butter. With more butter, the cream would melt soon.
I want to decorate my cupcakes. Do you suggest Italian meringue or buttercream?
It depends upon how you prefer your BC to be. If you want mildly sweet one, then go for IMBC. Else use American BC.
for medium consistancy how much milk should we add?
Add tablespoon of milk and mix. If you need even thinner, keep adding by tbs until you reach the preferred consistency.