Advice for a novice please!!

[New Mrs W]

Good morning everyone.

This is my first post in here after quite some time stalking the threads and getting handy little tips for my very amature home baking. But as my baby's birthday approaches I want to bake some cupcakes etc that look as good as they taste.

I have had a little go this morning. TBH I am pretty happy with the cupcakes themselves; they are light, fluffy and golden and they taste pretty good too! I have used a piping bag and nozzle to put some jam in the middle and am really happy with how that worked. But . . . I want to do some lovely colours/effects on the top of the cupcakes. I tried this morning to make a very simple butter cream. I just used butter and icing sugar (didn't use vanilla as it makes me gag, but maybe I should have?) and added some natural blue food colouring. The first attempt I kept adding more colouring as it was a very pale blue and I had wanted to get it darker. But I found that it kind of made the buttercream seperate, if that makes sense? And it tased foul!! So I threw it out and tried again, this time settling for the paler colour. It didn't seperate this time, but I can't say it tasted delicious - not as bad as the previous one but still not yummy.

So, any advice? How can I get the butter cream a darker blue? How can I make sure it tastes yummy? Should I use something completely different to buttercream? And any other tips/ideas that I can use to make the cup cakes extra gorgeous would be appreciated.

Thank you xxxx

 

[orange-sox]

Hello lovey!

Have you previously made your buttercream and enjoyed it? Buttercream/frosting is usually down to personal taste so I would play around with a few different recipes until you find one that you like, some people don't like it at all and prefer simple icing sugar and water (just to make things more complicated).

The reason for the separation and colour/taste issues is the food colouring you are using - if you purchase some food colour pastes or gels (which are extremely concentrated) you will get a much better colour effect and no separation. They're easily available on the internet, or in some shops - I see you live in west yorkshire (like me), if you pop along to your local Hobbycraft, cake shop or The Range you should be able to pick up some Wilton colour gels.

Hope this helps x

 

[New Mrs W]

Ooh thanks. I shall pop to The Range this afternoon. Didn't even think of trying there! Xx

 

[KittyVentura]

You'll also find it useful to make sure that your butter is well "warmed" before you start mixing. I tend to take mine out of the fridge about 12 hrs before I use it. I add a splash od milk and I keep the milk out about 30 mins before using to take the edge off. xx

 

[New Mrs W]

Thanks Kitty, I'll have a go at that too.

I found the Wilton colour gels and they are freakin' awesome!!! The colours are so vivid and as I had to use such a small amount they had no effect on the buttercream at all! I shall now experiment with the actual buttercream itself using a little milk xx