Alternative To Royal Icing
Decorating By weederberries Updated 2 May 2007 , 5:47pm by Sugar_Plum_Fairy
I'm making "cupcakes" for a little girl with severe allergies. The CC will actually be rice crispy treats and I'm hoping to make butterflies (just wire-type outlines) a week or two in advance to top the cupcakes with. I'm short for time because her party is the day before we leave the country for 2 weeks, so I need to get as much done in advance as possible, hence the design.
My question is, is there something I can do to stabalize and harden regular buttercream since she is severely allergic to eggs and therefore meringue powder?? I've piped tiny drop flowers in BC and let them harden with good success before, but these will be a bit larger (1 inch or so) and a less stable shape.
Thank you,
Lisa
Another kink...
I thought a crusting buttercream would be ok for her, but when I looked at the ingredients in the shortening, it has Soy products, which she is also allergic to.
Ok, so the new question... what kind of icing can I use that will crust (preferably very sturdily) without any egg, wheat, soy and nut products???
Have you checked the ingredients of Hi-Ratio shortening? I'm not sure what is in it.
You could make the wilton class buttercream icing with all butter and no meringue powder (i never put this in any of my icing anyways). I don't know if these would actually crust but if made well enough in advance you can let airdry so you can pick them up at least (or freeze to move around)
HTH
I like the idea of either using chocolate(like a CT) or fondant/gumpaste. GL with your cc's=) Jen
Here is a link to Chocolate Transfers incase you have not seen a tutorial yet. A cc member, cali4dawn did an awesome tutorial on it. The chocolate transfers begin on page 2=) HTH some, Jen
http://home-and-garden.webshots.com/album/111071540UEhrpE?start=12
Thanks for the ideas ladies.
Does anyone have a bag of candy melts? Could you check the ingredients for "shortening" and soy? I know you usually add a bit for smoothness, so it wouldn't surprise me if it's a base ingredient too.
Premium Candy Melts are combinations of sugar, cocoa, milk solids, palm kernel oil, lecithin, flavorings, and color.
thanks!
Premium Candy Melts are combinations of sugar, cocoa, milk solids, palm kernel oil, lecithin, flavorings, and color.
Man! I'm starting to get a feel for the hassle her mother has in finding food for her.
Lecithin is made from either Egg Whites or Soy. UGH!!!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lecithin
wedderberries, what exactly is she allergic to? That might help us to know what to suggest. Obviously eggs and soy, as you've already mentioned. Anything else?
http://www.cherrybrookkitchen.com/ is a great place to purchase baked goods from for people who have allergies.
edited: Should be "baking mixes and frostings" instead of "baked goods".
My sister has allergies to all sorts of stuff and it is hard to find things without those ingredients in it (soy, wheat, etc). Maybe a buttercream made with all butter? It crusts very well and you could even put it in the freezer before placing it on the "cupcake" to make it easier to handle. Just a thought! Hope you find a solution and good luck!
You could make the butterflies out of ~ melted hard candy....
frosting: I'd ask her mom what she has used....
Have you checked the ingredients on Cool Whip or PastryPride
or Rich's bettercreme?
If you can't find anything....what about green jello on top of the cupcakes to look like garden/grass.
wedderberries, what exactly is she allergic to? That might help us to know what to suggest. Obviously eggs and soy, as you've already mentioned. Anything else?
Thanks for the continued support!
The 4 things I listed above are her known allergies: soy, wheat, eggs and nuts.
Her mother hasn't used anything for her in the past, as this is her second birthday and her allergies weren't known at her 1st, so we're kind of starting from scratch. I made her cake for her first birthday...what I affectionately call a "death cake" now that we know it's full of stuff she can't have. Fortunately, she wasn't too keen on solids at her 1st birthday party, so she just mashed it around.
We have looked into those allergen sites before and the products that are gluten-free are not also egg free and visa versa and almost all contain Soy, so it makes things very difficult!
Looked into Pastry Pride and Bettercream and both contain soybean oil.
Does all-butter buttercreme really crust? I wasn't sure if it would. I assumed it was the shortening that makes it crust. I'll experiment with that because it is starting to look like the only option! Perhaps more sugar to make it crust better?
Any more ideas would be appreciated. I can't believe how much stuff has SOY in it!!
Yup real butter buttercream crusts very well and I don't think there is a need to add more sugar other than to get it to the right consistency. I made it for my sister since she has that same list of food allergies and it worked well and tasted great! HTH!!
Here are a few allergy websites that should help you. They have recipes, ideas, food recalls, etc.
http://www.foodallergy.org/recipes.html
http://members.shaw.ca/allergies/recipes.html
http://www.foodallergykitchen.com/substitutions.asp This one has food substitutions for baking
http://kidswithfoodallergies.org/?gclid=CIX5-qXt74sCFQkjWAodXHahUg
http://www.thenewhomemaker.com/cookingforallergies
It's probably a good idea to check out food recalls too, Wilton just posted one about it's candy melts:
http://www.foodallergy.org/alerts.html
Good Luck, it's not easy
yikes! poor mom and baby.
i don't have any suggestions, sorry. I try to skip everything that's chocolate cause my son is allergic to peanuts & nuts.
My son is also allergic to the other things you mentioned, but not serve. so he's been ok eating certain things.
Do you know if the mom has any cookies or treats she buys specially for her? maybe you can use them somehow has decorations?!
If you look at the glueten-free cakes at that link I gave to you (Cherrybrook Kitchen), I think they might have what you're looking for. When you click on the item there's a side bar that give you the product's ingredients, nutritional information and directions for use. Even the frostings, which only contain confectionary sugar (with cornstarch), -natural cocoa powder in the chocolate one - all natural vanilla flavor, and sea salt.
They sound like they might be great for her. I recommended them to a friend of mine for her children and she said her son loved them (a teen) and her daughter did too (about 8 years old). She said that they were pretty good. She could tell that it wasn't a "real cake mix", but it was one of the better ones she had tried. Two out of three of her children have allergies so she always has to be careful.
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