just wondering if there are people out there who do not offer traditional/american buttercream. i really dislike working with it and even more cleaning it up and cleaning it out of all my tools/equipment. i recently have found IMBC (finally) and am considering only offering the IMBC to my customers...no regular buttercream. i think it's more sophisticated and lighter but without sacrificing flavor. what are your thoughts on this?

thanks for your insight!
ashley

D'ya mean the kind made with crisco/powdered sugar?

if so, the answer is NO NO NO!

I think it is way gross, won't eat it, and wouldn't think of serving it to a guest or a customer.

Powdered sugar frostings are gritty. Crisco leaves a film in your mouth 'cause the melting point is so much higher than butter.

SMBC for me, because on the rare occasions that I eat frosting I want it to be GOOD..

*President and founder of the Cake Snob Club*

Me!! I don't use american buttercream at all unless someone *really* wants it (usually for a child's party) or doesn't care for SMBC (though I have yet to meet a person who didn't like it). I make SMBC and that's all I use. Even for cream cheese frosting.. just whip up some room temp cc and fold the SMBC/IMBC into that.. it's REALLY good and much more stable than powdered sugar based cc icing can be.

**edited to add that I've been a proud member of TCSC since 2007 (unofficially since much before, but it was official in 2007)

as usual, my favorite seester...... great minds think alike.....

Would never even dream of making a cake with powdered sugar frosting...not delicious and too hard to work with.

I would love to only do SMBC, but I just can't get mine stable enough. It melts even in my air conditioned kitchen. I tried icing a large 2-tiered cake a couple weeks ago with it and attaching some small gumpaste flowers to the sides, and they started to slip off after just about 30 minutes out of the fridge. I hate the taste of powdered sugar and shortening icings, but I do use it because it is much easier to get use and I can attach lots of decorations to it.

For those of you who only use SM or IMBC, how do you keep it stable and from melting? What am I doing wrong? I really, really want to use this type of icing only, but I'm ready to give up on it.

What's your recipe? Maybe we can help you.

I don't offer it. Sometimes I will do a mix of IMBC and an all-butter powdered sugar icing, when it's for kids (but that's only on cupcakes, and only if I need to).

I also am one of those snobs- I went with IMBC a couple of years ago and would never put that other on my cakes- it's my reputation on the line and I want to offer something truly professional and unique. If they wanted the other BC I figured they can buy a much cheaper cake at Walmart or the other grocery stores!

what's "American Buttercream"?

American style buttercream is shortening/butter based with powdered sugar as opposed to the european style buttercreams which are egg based with granulated sugar and butter.

You can sub 1/2 (or I know that leahs uses all) high ratio shortening for the butter in SMBC/IMBC to give it some more stability. I just don't care for the sickly sweetness and gritty mouth feel that powdered sugar gives to a frosting.

I only do American Buttercream as a special request (and the REALLY have to beg, and have to have tasted my other buttercreams first lol). I usually do swiss or italian, and occasionally a french or german (mousseline), but those last two are also only for certain desserts/cakes, and not usually with wedding/occasion cakes. My American Buttercream is most butter with a small amount of sweetex (for a large batch I use 5 lbs of butter to only about 600 grams of sweetex)

I don't offer it. If someone really wanted that kind, I suppose I would, but otherwise, I just love SMBC too much (although, I must say, sugarshack's icing is very pretty)!

I lean HARD towards IMBC. I offer ABC (american bc) but ONLY against my will and ONLY if it's an outdoor cake where there are heat issues, or if the bride has said they don't like the IMBC, and yes I've had some that don't. They say it's not sweet enough, too buttery, and one actually called it 'waxy'. I told her she's not supposed to eat it COLD, but she went with Bettercreme, so go figure (I hate that stuff, too; swear it's not food).

SO--Yes, I offer it, but not willingly. My samples always come with IMBC.

I don't like making it, cleaning up after it, eating it, working with it, and it almost without fail will cause blowouts in heat after being in the fridge, which I never get with my IMBC.

Every time I work with it, I like it less, actually.

I only use an American buttercream. I use the recipe from the Whimsical Bake House for thier House buttercream and everyone loves it. Not sickly sweet and not critty at all.

I have been making an odyssey in search of the best buttercream for me. While travelling thru the 'American' versions, (indydebi's is the best of them all, btw!!!!) I found mostly only children were liking it. The Dutch palette is used to whipped cream cakes mostly, so the sweetness of the powdered sugar wasn't appealing to adults at all.

I kept searching and have landed on either the Dutch buttercream (which I'm working on the recipe in English to post here) or Martha Stewart's SMBC. The Dutch one tastes like melty soft ice cream....yummers! Even my Dutch husband sneaks his pinky 'accidentally' in the bowl from time to time. And he ain't a sweets man, so that's a compliment!!

I wish I could offer something else, but under the Ohio Cottage Laws, I can't sell anything that needs to be refrigerated. Darn!

I'm in the only-ABC-if-you-beg club

I don't have to deal with the high heat all the time, but I have had SMBC out in the high 80's with no issues of having it melt off of a cake and it definitely shouldn't be melting off the cake at 68-72 degrees (what I assume your ac'd house it kept at). I wouldn't do a BC cake for an outdoor event in the summer, so I don't run into this so much. I know it's hard for you to avoid that living in the bowels of hell (temp wise only no ill will meant at all) Have you tried making it will all high ratio shortening? When you mix it up, is it stiff and stable and then falls apart when you have your cake outside?

You can try my recipe if you want..

10 egg whites
2 cups sugar
6 sticks unsalted butter (or 3 cups high ratio shortening or a combo of the two)
3 TBSP vanilla

Here's a post where I posted pics of the mixing process:

http://www.cakecentral.com/cake-decorating-ftopict-594605-.html

I try to keep it IMBC yummy stuff . The issue I'm having is I have an out side event in two weeks, and they want a cake . So it's either some form of P Sugar, and crisco, or bettercream. One's a handful of preservatives, and the other is full grease. Oh the travesty of it all LOLOL

Mike

o.k., I guess I am kinda slow because I had no idea you could make SMBC with hi ratio!

The only reason I wasn't too crazy about it before was because I thought it was a little too buttery. (I know, too buttery! crazy )

Jeanne, have you made it with the high ratio and if so what are the differences.

Thanks!

Amy

txkat,

what is the german kind? I have never heard of that before.

Oh and by the way...American Buttercream is actually a whole egg buttercream:
http://www.cookingforengineers.com/recipe/180/Buttercream-Frosting-American

The concoction made from confectioners sugar, some form of solid fat, and some form of liquid is called "powdered sugar frosting"

Sorry...pet peeve.