My buttercream frosting keeps sweating and I don't know how to prevent it. Is it because the cake is not room temperature when I'm frosting it? When I take it out of the freezer, I let it sit awhile first. It is still cold though.

Does anyone else frost on cold cakes or do you all wait until they are room temp. I use all butter...no shortening.

Also, why do the sides of my cake shrink in the pan? Am I letting it cool in the pan too long?

Still lots to learn! Thanks CC for all of your help.

Try frosting the cake after it has completly defrosted. It probably won't sweat if you do that.

It's probably your all butter icing though. It's so thin that at room temperature, it's probably melting a little bit. I had the same experience last week.. which was fine because I covered mine in fondant.

Just so you know, my cake shrinks in the pan as well. I was under the impression that a little bit of that is good because you want it to come out nice and not stuck to the pan. The more Pam or Shortening/flour you use, I would say..the more it will come away from the pan.

Hope this helps.

If your cake shrinks in the pan a lot, you are either overcooking it, or leaving it in the pan too long. The residual heat from the pan is can cause the shrinking.

It was a 11x15 pan and I collared it with parchment paper, but it still pulls away.

On the frosting question, if the cake is room temp, and the frosting is room temp, it shouldn't sweat?

Last question...LOL If I add more powdered sugar to my all butter buttercream frosting, will it crust? I want it to crust but it has not been doing that.

Thanks all for your help here.

I'm gonna go with it being all butter icing. It's probably going to melt when you bring it out. I use shortening/butter with a more shortening ratio. HTH

I use Pam on my pans. If I sprayed all the way up the sides it seems to pull away from the pan more. I started spraying just the bottom and the bottom edges and I just use a knife to seperate it from the sides. It seems to not shrink.

I use all butter buttercream and I don't get sweating. The only time that it has sweated was when the cake (already decorated) had to sit in the freezer over night. When it was defrosting is when it was sweaty. Just make sure everything is room temp and you should be fine.

About the cake pulling away.... I don't mind that it does it a little. It just allowes enough space around my cake boards so that there is never any cake showing through.

Thanks everyone for your quick responses. I have another cake tomorrow. I will make sure that everything is room temp this time and see what happens..........stay tuned!