Swiss Meringue Buttercream

There are three types of buttercreams that are most often used: American Buttercream, Swiss Meringue Buttercream, and Italian Meringue Buttercream.

American Buttercream, or simply called as buttercream is the simple mixture of sugar and butter whipped together milk or cream and some flavoring. It is rarely used in the professional bakeries

Swiss Meringue Buttercream is the most often used buttercream in the bakeries. It contains of egg whites along the sugar & butter. Egg whites along with sugar is heated to a certain temperature on a double boiler.

Italian Meringue Buttercream is the most difficult buttercreams of the three. It is very tricky as here we have to add the hot boiling sugar syrup to the egg whites which will be whipping simultaneously on very high speed.

Ingredients :

• 3 large egg whites

• 1 cup, 200 grams sugar

• 1 cup, 227 g unsalted butter at room temperature

• 2 tsp flavoring (I used vanilla)

Method :

• Separate the egg whites from the yolks in a bowl. Make sure there is no yolks in them. Best is to break each egg separately in one bowl and then put the whites in the bowl you will use for whisking it and then break the next egg. This way if in any egg the yolk has mixed with the whites, it will not affect the whites you have already got.

• Add the sugar to the egg whites and whisk them together either using hand or by a and mixer with whisk attachment for 2 minutes.

• Fill a pot half with water and put it for boil. Once it starts to boil, keep the bowl of egg white & sugar mixture on the top and let it cook till the sugar dissolves in the eggs and there are no grains left.

• Keep whisking it all the time. Use the candy thermometer to check the temperature as it should not exceed 160°F. Once it reaches that temperature, remove the bowl away from the boiling water. Using fingers check the whisked meringue, it will be like a thin thread (the same way it is in the sugar syrup/ chaasni we make).

• Now transfer to the stand mixer/ hand mixer with whisk attachment, whisk the meringue on medium at start, slightly increasing to high speed till it cools and holds it to stiff peaks. It will take 5-10 minutes to reach at stiff peak consistency. (Hand mixer may take more time than the stand mixers. Stiff peaks are must, droopy peaks no-no)

Once the meringue is ready, it's time to add the butter to the it. Cut the butter into small cubes and keep them. The butter should be soft to touch but cool.

• Scrape the meringue from the sides and whisk on the medium speed. Add one butter cube at a time and let it incorporate fully before adding another. Once all the cubes are added, stop and scrape off the sides again and then again increase to high speed and whisk the buttercream.

There is a chance that the buttercream will cuddle or go soupy but this happens because of the emulsion of meringue with butter fat. Also the temperature of butter also can cause it. No worries! Just keep on mixing it till it all come together which may take 5 minutes or a bit more.

• The buttercream should be smooth, fluffy, and creamy. Add the vanilla essence, scrape the sides of the vessel and whisk one more time. The color of buttercream can turn out a bit yellow depending on how much butter you use. Mine was yellowing only. You can add the food color in this case to get the all white color.

This recipe will yield 3 cups of buttercream which can be used to frost 2 layers 6'' cake.