I have been doing a lot of reading lately about buttercreams. I had a horrible pastry teacher in culinary school, and I have always been confused about the different types of buttercream, what classifies them and why one would use one over another.
After having tasted a true Italian buttercream at work, however, (our pastry chef was using it to frost a wedding cake) I was hooked and had to understand, once and for all, the basics of buttercreams. So, out came my trusty friend Gisslen.
As it turns out, there are 3 types of buttercream:
Simple buttercream, is the type we all grew up with…butter whipped with confectioners sugar. It holds well, and is super easy to make, and is tooth-achingly sweet.
Meringue buttercream, as a group, are icings that are made by first beating egg whites, and then adding boiling syrup or sugar. Then, soft butter is whipped into the meringue. The result is a soft, light and fluffy icing with the delicate taste of butter.
French buttercreams are similar to meringue buttercreams, but are made with yolks or whole eggs instead of exclusively whites. The yolks made for a richer icing.
I have already encountered meringue-type desserts in the form of French macarons, however my recipe uses a raw sugar preparation, where the sugar is simply whisked into the frothy egg whites until they dissolve on their own (I learned how to make these at the restaurant…it’s the quick and easy macaron technique.) So, I embarked on my first cooked-sugar meringue, and it was much less intimidating than I expected! Though I wouldn’t recommend attempting it without a recipe and candy thermometer – our pastry chef eyes the measurements and sugar temperature by “the size of the bubbles” – I’ll have to work on that one.
I got this recipe from Pastry Chef Online, and used the technique from my Gisslen. Gisslen has an almost identical recipe, but i yeilds a 5 lb batch and I couldn’t be bothered to do the math. Also, he adds a bit of shortening to stabilize the buttercream, but I hate the mouth-feel of shortening so of course I used only butter.
Italian Buttercream
Ingredients:
4 oz egg whites
8 oz sugar
2 oz water
10 oz butter, cubed and soft
1/2 vanilla bean (or 1 1/4 tsp vanilla extract)
Technique:
1. Begin to bring sugar and water up to a boil. At the same time, start to whip the egg whites. The goal is to have your egg whites at soft peaks at the same time as your sugar reaches 244 F. Don’t be afraid to slow down the speed of your mixer if your whites are getting close, or crank it if vice versa.
2. Turn the mixer down to medium so that your syrup doesn’t splash, and add in a stream. Then, crank the mixer up to high and whip until the bottom of the mixing bowl is completely cool to the touch and your meringue is thick, shiny, and at hard peaks. (This actually took a lot longer than I expected. Anticipate at least 10 minutes of whipping.)
3. At this point, begin to add the soft cubes of butter, one cube at a time. Don’t get impatient and wait until the previous cube has been blended into the meringue before adding the next. You will get to a point when the meringue will suddenly change to a luscious, whipped texture.
4. After you have incorporated all of the butter, add the vanilla bean.
By incorporating the hot syrup, you have essentially cooked your egg white, so the buttercream will last at least 2 weeks in your fridge, and also freezes nicely, just re-whip it at room temperature to bring it back to life. I have a half liter patiently waiting for the next baking adventure!
Also, this is Bobbie‘s first photographic contribution to the blog! My brilliant boyfriend and partner…I cant wait to post more of his gorgeous documentation of our life in and around the kitchen.
