What is up with my buttercream icing? I did a cake today for a customer and put it aside to clean up. When i went to give it to the customer it was so shinny it looked like it was sweating or really really oilly. It looked really gross. I felt so bad and completely embarrased by it. The customer said she loved that cake and I have not heard from her since. I'm still upset about the whole thing and i don't know what happened. I use half butter and half shortning recipe. The only change I have made was that I stopped using meringue powder because it made the icing toooooo crusty. It was not too hot in the house either. Do you guys have any ideas for me?? I need help 
It might just be that you din't put enough sugar in it. When you use too much meraingue powder is when the BC get REALLY crusty. I would try using a little less. I think that the sugar to fat ratio was probably off a little bit. Do you have a pic?? I bet it's not near as bad as you think. We are our worst critics
I work with someone that decorates cakes too and her icing is always shiny. I always think her cakes look very nice. We both use the same recipe, but several girls in the office thinks that hers tastes funny. Sometimes I've wondered if the icing was supposed to be shiny. Did you change a brand of ingredients for this cake? I've noticed my icing turning out different whenever I use different brands. I don't know if this helped or not, just my thoughts.
I have never made a frosting using shortening so I can't really answer this.
Just my opinion:
Having said that, it sounds to me that you may have just overwhipped your butter, thus the liquids began separating from the solids
If I am making a choclate bc using just butter and whip it til it's just right, then pour in the melted chocolate, but DID NOT let it cool enough it will then start melting the butter (separting solids from liquids) and produce a greasy icing.
Hi guys,
Thanks for the advice. It's really hard to see in the picture what I'm talking about. The only thinkg that I have done differently is I just bought a new mixer which is alot more powerful then the old one I had. Is it possible that I mixed it too much or is it more likely that there is too much butter. Anyother ideas would be great.
Thanks
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