Sometimes a question gets asked little or not at all, and then suddenly you get it several times a week. It is as if everyone suddenly has the same idea. I always find that rather peculiar. In this case, I’m talking about flavored buttercream or more specifically; how to flavor buttercream.
I think my basic buttercream recipe is absolutely fantastic but it is a basic recipe for a good reason. You can vary it endlessly! And with buttercream you can not only vary the flavor but also the color.
In terms of the different colors, you can simply use a gel food coloring, which is the easiest thing to do. But you can also use different ingredients for creating that effect while some methods also introduce a flavor along with the color. Another super easy way to do this is to add different extracts (like vanilla extract) to the buttercream.
So flavoring buttercream is not difficult but there are few things to consider.
There is a lot you can do when introducing different flavors into your buttercream, but also a few things you need to be aware of.
Depending on what you’re adding you could run the risk of the buttercream becoming too liquid or thin. Which is obviously something you don’t want.
The two most important things to consider are moisture and temperature. Butter does not mix well with (too liquid) moisture, so neither does buttercream. A small amount of liquid is still an option, but it is wise to add this in portions.
Temperature is also really important. Make sure your flavor ingredients are at the same temperature as your homemade buttercream. If the temperatures are too different you run the risk of your buttercream splitting. Same goes for adding too much liquid.
Probably the most popular buttercream flavor is chocolate. And with good reason as chocolate buttercream frosting is easy to make and can be done in two different ways. The easiest way is to add unsweetened cocoa powder. Just add the powder to taste and you have the best buttercream frosting in chocolate flavor.
Another way to add chocolate is to add melted chocolate to the cream. Make sure you let the chocolate get to room temperature (just like the cream) and then fold it into the cream. You can use the bowl of a stand mixer if you want and do this at low speed with the whisk attachment. Although doing this by hand is just as easy.
You can make white chocolate cream this way (so good! I’ll share my recipe soon!) Or use your favorite chocolate bar, the sky’s the limit!
Using fruit to flavor your buttercream is also very good, but can sometimes be a bit tricky. You can put pieces of fruit through the cream, which is easy (and tasty!). But if you don’t want pieces of fruit, but a fruit flavor, you have to be a bit more careful.
You will be using fruit puree or fruit juice, which brings me back to the question of moisture. In order to avoid the risk of the mixture splitting you can boil down your (for instance) strawberry puree for making strawberry buttercream to reduce the amount of liquid in the puree.
This way you have evaporated most of the moisture and you’re left with a more concentrated flavor and a thicker liquid. You want the right consistency between the frosting recipe and the flavor you’re adding.
An alternative is to use jam, which can also be used to flavor your buttercream. However, do not add too much. There will be a tipping point where your mixture becomes runny and it is difficult to predict when this will happen. So keep adding small amounts and test in between to see if the flavor is right. That is the best way to avoid having the mixture split.
Now I have given you the tips for the requests I receive most often, but there is so much more you can do. Think about adding lemon curd for instance for a lemon flavor, nut pastes (peanut butter, almond paste and such) are also a great idea for a more nutty end result. Use a delicious caramel sauce (or dulce de leche!) for a caramel buttercream, sprinkle bits of cookies through it or make a chocolate cream with bits of fresh fruit.
The possibilities are endless, and that’s the fun part!
And perhaps most importantly, here is my basic buttercream recipe which is an ermine frosting recipe that is perfect for adapting to your needs! You can use this base for all kinds of flavor combinations.
If you accidentally added large amounts of fruit puree into your buttercream a bit of powdered sugar might solve the issue. There is also a difference in how an ermine frosting recipe reacts as compared to an American buttercream recipe. Try and fix it by adding 2-3 tablespoons of icing sugar at one time. If the buttercream has gotten too warm placing it back in the fridge might also solve the issue.
Vanilla is the perfect cake to hold most flavor combinations. You can go classic and use strawberry but you can also make a classic vanilla buttercream frosting by using vanilla extract.
The perfect flavor to add to pumpkin would be to add some pumpkin spicemix. You could also use my own Dutch speculaas mix or just go for some cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg and/or cardamom. Those will all work well in the buttercream and give it a great taste (and smell!) also great for using on carrot cake.
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