Frosting Recipes

Perfect for cozy holiday mornings, First Look Then Cook shares a recipe for homemade cinnamon rolls.  This gooey cinnamon roll icing recipe couldn’t be easier to make and contains just four ingredients.  The cinnamon roll itself (recipe after the jump) is also delicious and relatively low in fat.

Easy Cinnamon Roll Frosting Recipe (from First Look Then Cook)

3  tablespoons  butter, softened
2  tablespoons  heavy cream
1/2  teaspoon  vanilla extract
1  cup  powdered sugar

To prepare icing, combine 3 tablespoons softened butter and cream; stir with a whisk. Stir in vanilla. Gradually add powdered sugar; stir until blended. Spread icing over rolls; serve warm.

Cinnamon Rolls « First Look, Then Cook.

Frosting recipes rely upon fat to create flavor and texture.  As we see, there is enormous variety in the fats used in frosting recipes.  We seen cream cheese and whipped cream but also yogurt and avocados.  All of these contribute to a rich, delicious cake or cupcake frosting.

Two of the most common fats used to make frosting from scratch are butter and vegetable shortening.   Just like in pie crust recipes, bakers have very strong feelings about which one (or combination of the two) produce the best results.

The advantage of using butter in a frosting recipe  is its flavor.  Butter adds a rich, melt-in-your-mouth feeling to the frosting.  Using vegetable shortening can be preferable for its texture, because it makes for a lighter, fluffier frosting.  However, shortening is all fat (butter is around 80% fat) and not especially flavorful.

The solution?  We’re now trying a combination of butter and trans-fat free vegetable shortening (Smart Balance, Spectrum Organics and Crisco make it) to achieve the best frosting flavor and texture.  Ratio of each to be determined! We’ll let you know how it goes.

Unlike cake frosting that you want to remain pliable and fluffy, cookie icing is a different story.  While cake frostings use large amounts of butter or other fats to keep them from drying out, cookies use a different ratio of fat to sugar so that the frosting dries smoothly, hardens and doesn’t move. All this while maintaining its vibrant color and tasting delicious!

We came across two easy, fabulous recipes for sugar cookie icing at Simply Recipes.  One creates a more textured look and is more suitable for piped decorations.  The other is smooth and glaze-like and makes your cookies safe for stacking.  Both harden nicely and make your cookies look festive and professional.

Here’s the first cookie icing recipe.  Look for the other after the jump.

Sugar Cookie Icing Recipe #1

1/3 cup Crisco (trans fat-free) or a 1/3 cup of softened butter
1 pound of confectioners sugar
About 1/4 cup of milk
1 teaspoon of vanilla

Mix icing ingredients together until smooth. Separate into different bowls, add food coloring to achieve various colors. Spread on cookies with a butter knife, use cake decorating piping equipment to add decorative accents. If you want the sprinkle type decorating candies to stick, brush the cookie with clear Karo syrup and then sprinkle.

Sugar Cookies Recipe | Simply Recipes

Delectably Yours shares a recipe for a giant chocolate cake with whipped chocolate frosting.   This is a simple recipe that’s perfect for a deep and complex dark chocolate cake.  It’s also an easy recipe that’s forgiving when spreading on the cake or cupcakes.

Chocolate Whipped Cream (From Delectably Yours)

2 cups Heavy Cream

1/3 cup Confectioner’s sugar

3 tbsp cocoa powder

If you find your cake to be very sweet, go ahead and reduce the sugar in the whipping cream.1. Put the cream, sugar and cocoa in a large well-chilled bowl. Its recommended that you chill the bowl you are going to whip cream in, and the beaters if they are hand beaters in the fridge for a good 20-30 mins. However, this recipe asked for mixing these ingredients NOT beating/whipping them and covering the bowl and then chilling the mixture in the refrigerator for an hour.Very conveniently, we missed the chilling for one hour step. We just chilled the bowl and the beaters and then beat the whipping cream It turned out okay!2. Remove from refrigerator and beat cream until thick. Add liqueur if you wish, at this point. Once the cream falls in soft mounds when the beaters are lifted in air, it is ready.

via Delectably yours,: Think of the Devil…..

Egg whites are key in marshmallow making and the same goes for this fantastic and simple marshmallow frosting recipe.  Rather than calling for marshmallow Fluff, where there are a lot of ingredients you may not really want, this simple recipe calls for just egg whites, sugar, cream of tartar and vanilla extract.   Mixing until stiff glossy peaks, you’ll have a frosting that beautifully piles high on top of cakes and cupcakes.   Chocolate cake would be a natural fit.

Marshmallow Frosting (from Martha Stewart Marshmallow Frosting Recipe, originally from Jennifer Shea of Trophy Cupcakes).

Ingredients

Makes enough for 2 dozen cupcakes

* 8 large egg whites
* 2 cups sugar
* 1/2 teaspoon cream of tartar
* 2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract

Directions

1. Place egg whites, sugar, and cream of tartar in the heatproof bowl of an electric mixer. Set over a saucepan with simmering water. Whisk constantly until sugar is dissolved and whites are warm to the touch, 3 to 4 minutes.
2. Transfer bowl to electric mixer fitted with the whisk attachment, and beat, starting on low speed, gradually increasing to high, until stiff, glossy peaks form, 5 to 7 minutes. Add vanilla, and mix until combined. Use immediately.

Marshmallow Frosting and more delicious recipes, smart cooking tips, and video demonstrations on marthastewart.com.