I always have real trouble with smoothing buttercream, Ive got better but I still prefer working with fondant. However I have to make a cake tonight and its going to be buttercream. I want to try a recipe.

Can you give me ideas on what ones in the recipe section are good? It has to be all butter as we cant get Crisco here in NZ. And crusting to so I can TRY and smooth it.

Also do you use unsalted or salted butter?

I know this question gets asked a lot, I did do a search but it came up with pages of unrelated post.. Id really appreciate any help you can give.

Cheers
Kathryn

This is my personal favorite.
http://www.cakecentral.com/cake_recipe-2426-Italian-Meringue-Buttercream--Shirleys-Method.html

My favorite is the marshmellow buttercream off of this site...smooths so easily and taste really good without an overpowering butter taste! Good luck!

I have a really nice buttercream on my web site: www.thesugarfix.com. It does call for 1/2 shortening and 1/2 butter, but it's really good with all butter. It's softer though.

I also suggest unsalted butter so that you can control the amount of salt you want in your frosting. I usually put about 1/2 tsp. of salt in mine. Most salted butter has 1 tsp. of salt per stick.

Good luck. If you use the recipe I hope you like it.

Michele

I might be totally wrong, but I thought all-butter icings would not crust. Yes?

No?

Someone who knows for sure, enlighten us all, please.

Just from my experience, even if there is a small amount of butter my icing doesn't crust. I use a Crisco based icing and sometimes reduce the butter to a couple of Tbl's if I'm doing some decorating that needs a firmer icing, but it still never crusts.

I don't know if that is different though if you are using a cooked or meringue type icing. Wow, I can't imagine life without access to shortening!

They LIGHTLY crust . Use the hot spatula method to smooth. -
Take a metal spatula, put in boiling hot water; wipe dry and smooth; every few strokes repeat the hot water. (Remember to dry every time!) The heat melts the butter slightly letting it get very smooth. The retro cake in my photos was smoothed that way.
Thanks be to the wonderful ladies and gents on CC.

There's a tutorial on here that teaches you to frost perfectly. It's called the "upside down icing technique". I had so much trouble being a newbie getting a smooth side and top until I started using this method. You may want to give it a try.

http://www.cakecentral.com/article6-Upside-Down-Icing-Technique-for-Perfectly-Smooth-Icing.html

Thanks for all the ideas and suggestions, I normally make my icing by feel, throwing in butter and icing etc, which is exactly why I probably have trouble! My all-butter icing does crust but it dries quite quickly. I tried to roller method last night and that worked quite well, but I have real trouble getting the sides smooth and that crisp edge you all get amazes me.

The vegetable shortening we have in NZ is in a block, its not soft but as it is coming into summer here I might try using it as it will be softer with the warmer weather.