That was fast. Reader Linda writes in to ask whether chocolate buttercreams are the same thing as chocolate frostings. The answer is no. Chocolate frostings — milk, dark, and white — are more like ganaches than they are like buttercreams, which is to say they are chocolates made spreadable by the addition of fat or […]
READ ONPerhaps my favorite feature of real buttercreams, aside from their fundamental deliciousness, is the extent to which they can be manipulated. For the creative baker, there’s virtually no end to it. A complete catalog is impossible, though I’ll do my best to summarize some of the most common variations. Extracts are obvious, and there are […]
READ ONI’ve had several readers write in to ask that. In fact I posted them in my personal order of preference (for cakes) …Italian meringue first, American-style last.
READ ONYou know…cheese, bread, chocolate…buttercream? It’s enough to give a food-conscious Yankee a complex. However it’s really not such a bad thing when you consider that Americans (and other New Worlders) are and always have been consummate experimenters — forever ready to cast tradition aside and embrace the new. Sometimes this works out for the best […]
READ ONWhen you’re the father of two very small girls you ask yourself a lot of things, like: how many more games of “lost pony in the fairy forest” can I play before my masculine self-image completely implodes? By extension, you wonder what it might be like raising boys, whether your days of sipping tea from […]
READ ONOnce you see how this is made, you won’t wonder why American-style buttercreams have become the new standard — even in upscale bakeries — all over the world. OK, maybe not in the pâtisseries of Paris, but pretty much everywhere else. The reasons are primarily functional. Not only are the buttercreams in this family a […]
READ ONLeave it to the French to find a way to make one of the richest preparations in all of pastrydom even richer. How do they do that? By employing egg yolks in their classic buttercream instead of an egg white foam. What impact does this have on taste and texture? As you’d expect it makes […]
READ ONYou may have noticed that both of the meringue buttercream recipes I’ve put up have small amounts of cream of tartar in them. What’s it for? Oh, it’s just a little insurance policy, a bit of protective medicine in the event I get carried away with the whip while making my egg foam. For you […]
READ ONLooks a lot like Italian meringue buttercream doesn’t it? In fact it is very similar, though a bit denser. Like Italian buttercream, it’s excellent both for spreading and piping, since (as you can see) it stands up quite well on its own. The advantage SMBC has over IMBC is that it’s somewhat easier to make, […]
READ ONPastry student Nick writes in with this very good question about Italian meringue buttercream: When making the IMBC, does the heat from the syrup at 245F fully pasteurize the meringue? Or do standard undercooked food warnings apply? Friends, this is what gives me confidence in the pastry world of tomorrow. A student sees a delicious-looking […]
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