Buttercream Icing with Pudding

The best step-by-step guide to classic German buttercream icing with pudding: With this recipe, buttercream icing can be made by anyone!

With this simple buttercream recipe, nothing will go wrong! The cream is extremely important for many cakes and cupcakes, be it as a filling, a coating or as a frosting. It is versatile, wonderfully creamy and luscious. The problem of many hobby bakers: Buttercream never succeeds. But it is really not difficult to make a good buttercream yourself. I will show you how to do this in this article.

Instructions

No matter if classic with vanilla, chocolate or fruity: The buttercream basic recipe will also work if you bake rather seldom.

And how do you make buttercream? First of all, take the butter from the fridge. Then make a pudding from pudding powder, milk, and sugar. You only need 400 ml of milk instead of 500 ml as indicated on the package. The pudding must now cool down (but not in the fridge). To prevent skin from forming, stir from time to time - or cover the bowl with cling film.

As soon as pudding and butter have the same temperature, i.e. room temperature, you can start. The right temperature is the key! Beat the soft butter with icing sugar until light and frothy. Then add tablespoons of pudding. Done! The amount is enough to cover a cake of 24-26 centimeters in diameter thinly with buttercream and fill it once.

Ingredients

The main ingredients of the simple German buttercream with pudding are - clearly - butter, pudding, and sugar. In contrast to the French and Italian ones, it is a buttercream without eggs.

Top tip

The buttercream recipe is absolutely sure to succeed - as long as the pudding and butter are really at (the same) room temperature. If the butter cream does curdle, simply warm it slightly in a hot water bath, stir everything until smooth and then put it in the fridge again.

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Buttercream with pudding

The basic recipe for a light German buttercream with pudding. The simple buttercream is suitable e.g. for cakes or cupcakes.

Prep Time10 mins

Resting time15 mins

Servings: 1 cake (8 pieces)

Calories: 334kcal

Ingredients

• 1 pack custard powder for cooking; e.g. chocolate, vanilla, etc
• 400 millilitres milk
• 2 tablespoons sugar
• 250 grams butter soft and at room temperature
• 50 grams icing sugar

Measures in Metric units - Measures in U.S. Customary units

Instructions

• Make a pudding from pudding powder, milk and sugar (note: you actually only need 400ml of milk and thus less milk than the instructions say!) Put the pudding in a bowl and let it cool down at room temperature. When cooling down, stir again and again or cover with cling film to prevent skin formation.
• Put the soft butter, which must be at room temperature like the pudding, in a bowl. Beat the butter and icing sugar with a food processor or hand mixer and whisk for a few minutes until very light and frothy. Slowly stir in the pudding, spoon by spoon, until you have a homogeneous cream. Either decorate or fill the cake directly with a spatula or chill the butter cream beforehand to make it a little firmer.

Notes

The buttercream recipe is absolutely sure to succeed - as long as the pudding and butter are really at (the same) room temperature. If the butter cream does curdle, simply warm it slightly in a hot water bath, stir everything until smooth and then put it in the fridge again.
The amount is enough for a thin layer of filling and a thin coating of a 24-26 cm cake. For more layers or if you want a thicker coating, use 1.5 times the amount.
The pudding powder can be vanilla, chocolate, strawberry, caramel or cream. High-quality pudding powder tastes best with real bourbon vanilla or additional chocolate shavings.
To refine the cream you can use baking cocoa, spices such as cinnamon and tonka bean, liqueur, chopped nuts, melted and slightly cooled chocolate, mocha.

Variations

For chocolate buttercream, I prefer to use a little more expensive pudding powder with grated chocolate. But you can also prepare the cream with vanilla or strawberry pudding or flavor and color it. For example with liqueur, mocha, light and dark couverture, kirsch, brittle, ground or chopped nuts, cocoa, and nougat. Together with a sponge cake or sponge cake base and fruit, it quickly becomes a delicious cake.

Or you can use the cream to decorate my confetti cake or cupcakes with it. Typically, the mass is used mainly in classic baking recipes, such as Frankfurter Kranz, Donauwelle, or Grenade Splinters.

Serving size

The amount is enough for a thin layer of filling and a thin coating of a 24-26 cm cake. For more layers or if you want a thicker coating, use 1.5 times the amount. 

Frequently asked questions

Nutrition