Name: Peppermint Buttercream Frosting
Cook time: 10 min
Total time: 10 min
Ingredients: 1 Cup Unsalted Butter (softened); 4 Cups Powdered Sugar; 2 Tbsp Heavy Whipping Cream; 1 ¼ Tso Peppermint Extract

Peppermint Frosting is sweet, creamy and smooth with a delicious peppermint flavor and a rich and luxurious texture.

Total Cooking Time: 10 minutes

When making cake or other sweet treats, frosting is a great addition. It brings flavor to the table as well as decoration potential! Buttercream Frosting is one of the core types of frosting. It’s easy to make with only four ingredients and its absolutely delicious with its silky-smooth texture. Buttercream is also able to take on a plethora of flavor profiles. For this recipe, I am using a peppermint frosting to stay true to the original recipe of the Great British Bake-Off Week One – Technical Challenge!

Ingredients

Buttercream Frosting only needs three ingredients: butter, powdered sugar, and heavy whipping cream. This is the core for any butter-based frosting. Air is the most important ingredient but it won’t be listed in any recipe. Whipping air into the frosting is going to be the core of getting a creamy and smooth frosting.

Process

01

Prepping the Butter and Sugar

The process for making a flavored buttercream is super simple (which makes sense considering how few ingredients are needed for the recipe). We start with the butter – I like to whip it until its smooth and fluffy because I feel like it incorporates into the frosting better. Once we have the butter whipped, I added the powdered sugar and turned the mixer to the lowest possible settings. I try to avoid powdered sugar clouds whenever possible. This step also requires a fair bit of scraping the sides as butter plus powdered sugar is surprisingly dry.

02

Finding the Right Consistency

I like to add heavy whipping cream to help push the buttercream frosting to its final consistency. You can use milk for this part, but I prefer the taste that heavy whipping cream brings. And now, we whip. We whip for a long, long time. When I first started making buttercream frosting, I never whipped the mixture for enough time which left a raw butter flavor in my buttercream. Not a flavor that I particularly like.

03

Adding Flavor

Flavor is added once everything has been whipped and full incorporated. Using an Extract works for the simplest, and most effective, addition of flavor. My only issue with extract is that it is an artificial flavor so you don’t want to add too much. It can easily become overpowering and spoil the batch. And too much peppermint can end up tasting like toothpaste, if you’re not careful!

Lessons

What is Powdered Sugar?

Granulated sugar grounded and milled into a powdered state results in powdered sugar. Generally, most powdered sugars you purchase at the store will also include some sort of starch to prevent clumping. You’ll want to bake with powdered sugar when you need a quick-dissolving sugar. Or dusted onto baked goods for a finished effect. Just don’t add it to a cake with candles! Powdered sugar is a combustible dust so be very careful putting it anywhere near fire.