I made the swiss once and a lot of the people at my party liked it, I personally thought it was too buttery. Could it be, I didn't use enough flavoring in it? Also what is the difference between the Italian and swiss in taste? I was thinking of trying the italian to see if I like that better? Thanx!

Taste is the same, only the method is different.

You can play with the recipe by adding more flavoring and/or sugar if you like.

Did you use salted or unsalted butter? Using salted butter will make your Swiss Meringue taste extra buttery that is why they suggest using unsalted butter.

All butters, even $10.00/lb Plugra, have "natural" flavorings. If you study this elusive ingredient, you will find that they may have nothing to do with the original product and many times are generated in a lab, just concocted from ingredients found in nature.

The cheaper the butter, the more of that "natural" ingredient is used to enhance the flavor of an already inferior butter, not good enough for the name brands. With this comes an unnaturally (as not found in real butter), chemically produced additive that will amplify the flavor artificially. The cheap brands obviously use a cheaper version of this too. Add to this the fact that cheap butter is weighed down (literally so that you pay for it in the weight) with just plain old water, you are saving nothing and actually adding an ingredient that detracts from the flavor of your baked good more than other cheaper products.

So in baking, especially European buttercreams, use Land O' Lakes or Plugra. Another alternative is the fresh churned butter from farmers markets. It runs about $2.00 more per pound than Land O" Lakes.

I have found that with SMBC and IMBC, regular vs European butter makes a difference mainly for the most discerning taste buds. Most folks can't tell the difference between I/SMBC made with Plugra and that made with regular butter-- as they very well shouldn't as I/SMBC done properly should not taste like straight butter.