Is There Anything Wrong With These Proportions?
Decorating By frindmi Updated 16 Sep 2006 , 4:12pm by Rodneyck
Ok, so yesterday I made a white cake and I had a bunch of extra egg yolks so I thought I would give Sylvia Weinstock's egg yolk buttercream a try.
The recipe calls for the following:
2 cups sugar dissolved in 1/3 cup water
5 egg yolks and 1 whole egg
6 sticks of butter
6 tablespoons vanilla extract (or other flavoring)
So my concern comes with the proportion of sugar to the water. You're supposed to make a sugar syrup and boil it until it reaches 240 and then pour down the side of the mixing bowl... same procedure as a meringue buttercream. Well, I made it and everything went fine and then when I tasted it: Man, that was soooooooooo sweet! I mean, it was silky and rich like the IMBC but so much sweeter. The recipe I have for IMBC uses 1 1/4 cups of sugar dissolved in 1/2 cup of water and I don't find it too sweet. Do you think that's the problem? I thought the proportion sugar vs water was weird but that's what the recipe called for and I assumed it was right.... What do I do now with the buttercream? Will it be less sweet if I make it into espresso buttercream? Help!!!!! I don't want to waste all those ingredients....... It's ironic, everything started because I didn't want to waste the egg yolks....
Inma
Yah, wow, that's a lot of sugar!! I would say there has to be a way to save it though... think of the things that cut the sugar taste, like cocoa or, like you mentioned, espresso powder. Any tart flavoring would cut that sickly sweet taste I am sure! Let us know how you fare!! Good luck! (That also seemed like a LOT of flavoring... how did that part turn out, I mean other than being waaaay sweet... was it too much flavoring?)
It's not the sugar to water ratio, it's the amount of sugar in the recipe. (the amount of water really doesn't affect the sweetness, it mostly boils off) If you find it too sweet decrease the sugar some and try again. You can keep the water the same or a little less I think.
Thank you, guys!
I think I'm going to try and make some into chocolate (adding coffe and unsweetened chocolate) and see if that helps. My concern now is: Would I be able to freeze this kind of buttercream even though it's made with egg yolks? She (Sylvia Weinstock) says it refrigerates fine for 5 days but I don't have any use now for chocolate buttercream (I was going to flavor it with peach schnapps (sp.?) and use as the filling for a white chocolate cake I wanted to try but now what?????? I do freeze my IMBC but I think egg whites might react differently to freezing than egg yolks. Any ideas? Or do you care for some overly sweet buttercream? I can send by UPS express? 
Inma
Here is a better French (using yolks) Buttercream recipe, in my opinion, from one of my favorite books by James McNair, entitled Cakes. It uses far less sugar and he incorporates light corn oil instead of water which means you do not have to brush down the sides of the pot to remove the sugar crystals. Corn syrup by nature contains part water.
The recipe has some great variations as well, enjoy...
http://www.recipelink.com/cookbooks/1999/0811817687_4.html
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