When I started this post, I was thinking “I’m totally a swiss meringue buttercream master now. We are soulmates – I will now use it for everything.” I had a love, and its name was swiss meringue buttercream.
Then last Sunday it stomped all over my heart and made me cry. ;_;
If nothing else, it looks pretty.
Since I’d conquered the chocolate version of SMB, I thought that doing it without the chocolate would be an absolute cinch; now that I’d done it once I would be able to be a little more aggressive the second time. And to some extent, I was: it only took me one try to melt the sugar into the egg whites and I didn’t spend quite as much time waiting for the icing to come together. But somehow this time the SMB just didn’t turn out quite right.
Because I was using it to make a Mother’s Day cake for my Momma, I was pretty upset; the icing looked pretty, but it felt and tasted kind of greasy. It didn’t spread easily and it had a bit of a greasy shine…plus it tasted a bit too much like butter. Boo.
Looks kinda greasy here...or is it my imagination?
When I started adding the butter in, I thought I’d be clever and instead of leaving it out to let soften while I was whipping up the meringue, pulled it out shortly before the meringue was done; that way the butter being soft didn’t contribute to the soupy nature of the SMB. I think this worked…sort of. It still got soupy, but it didn’t seem nearly as bad. Still, I had to start adding butter to help it thicken up.
This is where I assume the problem occurred. The issue I think came from either one or two things I did:
- Just plain added too much butter. Didn’t give the SMB enough whipping time to firm up before adding more butter.
- …I may have used 1/2 stick salted butter because I was out of unsalted >.> (or so I thought. Found 2 cups more unsalted in the fridge later >.<).
Any suggestions? >.>
Despite the SMB turning out a little oddly, the cake wasn’t terrible. I went with a Martha Stewart version of a dark chocolate cake which turned out very tasty (if a touch over-cooked) and I did a great job with the decorations (if I do say so myself). The cake unfortunately slid on its platter on the drive to my parents’ house, messing up the frosting a bit, but my mother forgave me – she’s wonderful like that.
I hope everyone had a good Mother’s Day, either celebrating it yourself or telling your mum how great she is.
For Mom! <3
Dark Chocolate Cake
Halved from Martha Stewart; makes 1 6″ cake.
Swiss Meringue Buttercream
From Whisk Kid.
Mary Gezo
Formerly of both n00bcakes and !Blog, the two magically become one on Spatialdrift; expect some lazy baking and serious nerditude. Also, I love semicolons.
It’s almost always the butter temp. You definitely want it softened, such that it is the same temperature as the meringue that you beat enough to cool down to room temperature. If you don’t have room temperature butter and meringue, you don’t form an emulsion which is what meringue buttercream is.
Whoa, I never thought of SMB as an emulsion before…my brain just got pwnt. I guess I didn’t realize you could emulsify things into solids (obviously my chemistry is not in tip top shape >.>). What a cool way of looking at it.
So I guess I should just resign myself to keeping extra butter around for filling out my SMB? Or is there that sweet spot of butter temp where it won’t over-liquify the mixture, but will still emulsify successfully?
I have no SMB tips, but I love how your cake turned out! One tip I do have though is for the sliding issue – did you put a small dollop of frosting in the center of the plate before stacking the cake on it? That usually helps glue it down a bit.
Aww, I hate when SMB tastes like butter. Have you tried eating it out of the fridge? bleh.
Room temp butter! but also, my parents and boyfriend feel that all flavors (except chocolate) SMB tastes too much like butter and too unsweet unless I add strawberry preserves or other things to cut the thick flavor. Even sweetapolita had said at one point that it took some getting used to but now she loves it.
So picky and finicky. What a jerky icing. The beautiful ones are always difficult.
@Jessica – Oh, that’s a great tip for sliding! This is the first time sliding has ever been an issue for me, but it’s also the first really hot day I took a cake anywhere. I’ll definitely do that next time. 😀
@Stephanie – I haven’t tasted it out of the fridge…but it sounds like it’s gross. @.@ Le sigh, man I hope I can make it taste better next time…if my friends don’t like the SMB vanilla because it tastes too much like butter, I’m back to the drawing board for vanilla frostings!
Also lawl…diva frosting. 😀
aww, it looks pretty! I’ve found that if my meringue still looks soupy and is not coming together I’ll stick the bowl in the freezer for a few minutes and then re-try whipping it-whips right up after that. Vanilla bean paste is always a good addition too for a more vanilla flavor-if you don’t mind specks 🙂
OH! I keep forgetting about it, but have you ever had flour frosting? I’ve heard lots of good things about it and think Victoria made it once, if I recall… ha, yes! For her zebra bundt, in fact: http://districtchocoholic.blogspot.com/2010/12/experiments-for-team-party-zebra-bundt.html 🙂
Hi. Googled onto your site looking for a peach SMBC recipe. I feel SMBC is vastly superior to all frostings…and both my mom and I will eat it out of the fridge! (I’ve actually had my mom’s coworkers ask me to just make the frosting for them to eat by spoon-no cake!)
THe recipe I use is a slightly different ratio of eggs:sugar:butter. I use 4 egg whites:1.25 cups sugar:3 sticks butter (I’ve seen people use 2 sticks of butter instead of 3 with the 4 egg white base).
I follow the instructions from How To Eat A Cupcake and they’ve never failed me. (http://www.howtoeatacupcake.net/2008/02/face-your-smbc-fears.html)
With the strawberry SMBC I used pureed strawberries and the end result tastes like strawberry ice cream (recipe was either from Annie’s Eats or The Way The Cookie Crumbles, I think they are pretty similar anywho). For my vanilla SMBC I’ve used 2-3 tsp vanilla. I think when it gets to the point of flavoring it, you kinda have to taste as you go.
I’ll be attempting to make a peach SMBC with pureed peaches since I have a grocery bag full of peaches that are going to be UBER ripe in a day or so. Crossing my fingers! (I’ll let you know how it turns out)