Hi

If a cake has to be consumed on Monday afternoon, can I frost it with buttercream on Friday morning? I would like to keep it at room temperature, and not freeze it. I have read that the shelflife of a buttercream frosted cake is upto 3 days, hence the query. Mine will be consumed on the 4th day.

Thanks!

If this was for me at home... As long as it was covered I would still be eating it four days after making it...

If this was for someone else... I wouldn't have finished it three days before they pick it up without freezing it...

Thanks AAtKT :-( . That puts me on a really tight deadline.

The best option  is to do the cake on Saturday or Sunday .

I put buttercream cakes in the fridge all the time for a couple of days when I have a lot of orders.  It will be fine in there.

I'm with AAKt.  If it's for family, what's 4 days???  Give it the sniff test and if it passes and doesn't have any weird green colors, it's fine.

For other people:  I bake, tort, fill, wrap and freeze tiers up to 2 weeks in advance.  Pre-make twice as much buttercream as I think I will need (up to 2 weeks in advance), and freeze.   If I'm going to be using a lot of colors on my buttercream cake, I'll pre-mix the colors and put them in frosting bullets and freeze.  Here's a link on frosting  bullets:

Go to the 1:45 mark in the video to see the frosting bullet:

The night before I have to decorate I get all the supplies ready (mise en place), clean my work areas, and take the frozen stuff out to defrost over-night on the counter.  The following morning all I have to do is decorate and assemble and box up for delivery.

If I'm doing design work onto a buttercream cake, I bake close to delivery date, buttercream it and keep it covered in the fridge till ready to cover in fondant, then keep in a cool room in a box... If room is not cool enough (I'm lucky as my house is naturally cold), I have a fan blowing onto the box. It does not dry out the cake, as I've tested this as I was worried it might. I also place a muslin cloth on top of the box while fan is blowing, for extra protection. 

When I deliver, I ask the cake to be placed in as cool a place as possible till ready to be cut. The buttercream has always been fine. 

Apti, I recently discovered the bullets and love them, however, I found my colors seemed to separate a little over time. I've never frozen my icing, but do you not have to rewhip it before use? And do the colors stay mixed well? Thanks!

Thank you so much everyone. 

The cake board I was using was large and couldnt have fit in my fridge. So I ended up ganaching the cake this time instead of using buttercream. Very useful tips for future though.

newbeeatcakes ~~ Glad you were able to find an alternate way to get the cake done!

sweetpea428 -- I use an American style buttercream recipe with 1/2 white shortening and 1/2 butter, powdered sugar, etc.  It freezes beautifully and the colors do not separate and if I'm using what's in the "bullets" it comes out just fine without any re-mixing.