Buttercream icing is fantastic for decorating cupcakes and lots of cake decorating techniques. Some of my favourite uses are icing naked cakes, as a base for applying fondant icing to your cake and of course to make awesome cupcakes.
Buttercream Ingredients:
- 125g Butter (softened)
- 1 1/2 cups Icing Sugar
- 1 tablespoon Milk
Method:
Using an electric mixer, beat the butter in a bowl until pale. Gradually add icing sugar and milk, beating constantly until combined.
How to colour your buttercream icing:
To colour your buttercream icing we recommend Wilton icing colour concentrated gel. It can be used to colour buttercream, fondant and your cake batter (no, it doesn't fade when cooked unlike other food colours). As you only need apply a small amount with a toothpick it works out to be more economical than supermarket brand colours.
If you are using Black we recommend that you add some cocoa powder to your buttercream mix, so that you are starting with a dark colour. This means that you won't need to use as much colour gel to achieve the black colour.
We highly recommend a Wilton White White Icing Colour which is added to your buttercream icing to take it back to white. The amount you need to use varies on the amount of butter in your receipe (more butter, more white white). You can use it to make white of course, but is also helpful if you want pink instead of apricot. If you add pink to your buttercream mix it will have an apricot tinge, but with white white you will get true pink.
How to achieve you perfect cupcake swirl:
My quick answer to this is to use tip #1M, but there are a few other choices. Just start at the outside of the cupcake going round in a circle finishing in the centre. The items you will need can be purchased individually or in a set that we recommend (more economical), see our Wilton 12 piece Cupcake Decorating Set.
The above picture demonstrates the Wilton Three Colour Coupler, which is adds a little fun to your cupcakes.
Take a look at some other icing options as seen on our Chocolate Sea Shell Cupcakes or see our Easy Vanilla Cupcake recipe to use for any occasion.