Help Been Up All Night! Butter Cream Issue
Decorating By sweettreat101 Updated 14 Jun 2010 , 4:25am by sweettreat101
My butter cream keeps separating when I try to ice my cakes. I tried uses the hot knife method, paper towel etc and it's not working. Wedding cake due this evening and can't go to sleep until it's done. All I get are all lot of bubbles. Is there anything I can add to it to make it come together? Corn syrup would a little powdered sugar work. I was having trouble getting the correct color and think I over mixed the frosting. Can't do over because the cake has to match the other two. Thank you.
I had that happen to me once. The icing stuck to my knife and wouldn't stick to the cake as much as I tried.
I think my cake was too moist (I know, who would ever think a cake to be too moist) and I think my icing was too stiff.
I hope you get a good answer and wish you luck. It's tough to be in that position when you know you've got to finish the cake.
I think your icing is too stiff. I had that disaster on a HUGE cake I was making for 200 people!!! Once I thinned my icing a little with milk it was better.
Good luck to you.
It's probably too late now, but I agree, I think you need to add a bit of liquid to your frosting. Also, is your cake cold? You might try refrigerating it a bit if not. I always find when my cake gets to room temp, the frosting doesn't adhere to the cake as well. Hope all went well for you!
Nope still awake. Had to bake another cake my 10" fell apart. First is was the frosting then my top layer started to crack. I think the baking strips make the cakes to moist. Never had this problem before. UGH! Sad t thing it is my cousins wedding and I think I will have to stay home and sleep. Thanks everyone.
So sorry to hear that. Just drink a few Monster Drinks and keep dancing!!!! That should get your through the party.
If you are using Crisco that could be your problem. The new Crisco is 0 transfat. When I made buttercream that didnt' have butter in it my boarder kept falling off. I had to use the Wal-Mart brand of shortening as it has trasnfat in it. I also use butter which helps. Other then that I can't help you but I know the new Crisco is causing lots of problems.
When you say the icing is separting, based on the responses to your question, I'm assuming you mean the icing is pulling away from your cake? ("Separating" to me means the icing is separating in the bowl, i.e. you're getting a pool of liquid forming on the top of the bowl as the wet ingredients "separate" from the dry ingredients.)
No, the baking strips are not making your cake too moist. I use baking strips on ALL cakes, on ALL size pans and it has nothing to do with how moist or how dry the batter/recipe is.
I tend to disagree that zero-trans Crisco is the culprit because my icing works great ..... I never even knew crisco has changed their formula until I read all the other CC'ers complaining about. But I *DO* recognize it may be the recipe and how the recipe works with the zero-trans formula. On your next cake, try my recipe.
I don't believe there is such a thing as "overmixing" the icing. To get really smooth icing, you have to beat the bah-jeevers out of the fat to make sure the fat particles are pulverized into micro-pieces of nothingness. Underbeating icing will leave you with big 'ole hunks of fat that leave air tunnels in your icing when you go to ice a cake.
If your cake is too "wet" or your icing is too "dry", this will cause the icing not to stick to the cake.
When thawing cakes to work with, leave the saran on them as they thaw so the condesnsation gathers on the saran and not on the cake. If the condensation gathers on the cake itself, it's like spraying the cake with a spray bottle of water.
I crumb coat the cake when it's about 1/2 to 3/4 thawed. Once the crumb coat crusts, then I can ice the cake with no problems. The final coat of icing isn't actually attaching to the cake ... it's attaching to the air-dried, crusted thin coat of crumb-coating-icing.
When you say the icing is separting, based on the responses to your question, I'm assuming you mean the icing is pulling away from your cake? ("Separating" to me means the icing is separating in the bowl, i.e. you're getting a pool of liquid forming on the top of the bowl as the wet ingredients "separate" from the dry ingredients.)
That's what I thought she meant too. That is why I wondering which recipe she used. I have seen icing separate the way you describe. It happened to some of my fellow students in my Wilton class. Come to find out they made it and left in the car all day while they worked. 
I tend to disagree that zero-trans Crisco is the culprit because my icing works great ..... I never even knew crisco has changed their formula until I read all the other CC'ers complaining about. But I *DO* recognize it may be the recipe and how the recipe works with the zero-trans formula. On your next cake, try my recipe.
I thought she would have better luck with your recipe too. And it goes over so much better than the "Wilton" icing.
I don't believe there is such a thing as "overmixing" the icing. To get really smooth icing, you have to beat the bah-jeevers out of the fat to make sure the fat particles are pulverized into micro-pieces of nothingness. Underbeating icing will leave you with big 'ole hunks of fat that leave air tunnels in your icing when you go to ice a cake.
On my next batch I am going to beat the heck out of the fat before I add the other ingredients in your recipe. But I have found that if I beat the heck out of it after I add the powdered sugar and water, I get a grainy frosting. I didn't add the dream whip because I was using it as practice. I just didn't like the texture at all. Even my "Wilton" icing came out grainy after beating it too long after adding the powdered sugar. When comparing my process to my fellow Wilton students who had a nice creamy icing, it was my beating time that was different, everything else was the same.
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I use Indydebi's recipe and I beat the crisco for 15 minutes (at least) before adding any other ingredients. It looks like sour cream by the time I'm finished "pulverizing" it. 
After incorporating all of the other ingredients I let the mixer run for at least 20 minutes maybe more. The longer I let my mixer run the creamier the icing is. 
I also start out by adding the least amount of milk that the recipe calls for if I have to add any after that I add only a tsp. at a time until I have the right consistency. I find that I add less milk since I started beating the crisco before adding anything else.
I read Mamawrobin's advice (on beating just the shortening for 15 minutes before adding any other ingredients), before I made my first batch of frosting. It really, really works to do it that way! My frosting is always 100% creamy and smooth. Thanks, Mamawrobin!
I'm sorry I don't have an answer for buttercream but wanted to urge you not to skip the wedding. I think you'd regret that more than a less than perfect cake! Like the phrase goes.... you can sleep when your dead. 
I hope it all works out for you! Good luck. 
I took your advice and added milk to my butter cream it worked. I had to bake another 10 inch layer luckily I had one in the freezer otherwise I would have never finished. The grass took forever. Had to cut individual grass strands out of fondant and place all around the sides of the cake. Plus I still had to make 80 cheesecake wrapped strawberries, fill and frost cupcakes and cream puffs. When putting the butter cream on my cake I kept getting little bubbles. Every time I tried to smooth out the frosting it would make another bubble. That's why I thought I had over mixed the frosting. I use hi ratio and butter. I wasn't able to go to the wedding just to tired. I hadn't slept since Thursday night and just could stay awake any longer. The wedding was at 6:00 pm Saturday and I ended up falling asleep while I was eating dinner. Woke up four hours later to find my food sitting next to me.LOL. What we do for the love of cakes. Thank you everyone for your help. My cousin loved her ugly log grass wedding cake and that's all that matters.
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