Perfect Piping Buttercream is the absolute best recipe for frosting cakes and cookies with a great consistency just right for piping your beautiful designs. This luscious buttercream frosting is light and airy with added flavor from vanilla and almond extract.
Best Buttercream
Frosting cut-out cookies for holidays is both my favorite and most dreaded activity. I LOVE frosting the first couple dozen cookies with beautifully ornate piped designs with buttercream.
I am alone in this process though because no one else in my family is willing to help. They claim they “can’t do it as well” and therefore are unwilling to even try. Total cop out!
Frosting for cookies
So 5-6 dozen cookies and hours later I am completely burnt out. The cookies are beautiful and taste amazing, but man oh man are my hands tired and eyes weary.
Frosting cookies should totally be a family affair and it would be much more fun. When I have children, I will happily let them slather on the frosting in the ugliest of designs, mostly because that means I won’t have to frost as many cookies! 😉
Best Buttercream for piping designs
Over the years my mother and I have perfected the recipe for frosting. We were looking for a balance of taste and how it piped. We used to use a royal icing, but it didn’t taste as good.
We later moved to buttercream for flavor but our original recipe was too thick to get nice piping shapes from. We altered that recipe over the years and finally landed upon this recipe that is absolutely perfect.
This perfect piping buttercream is our go-to frosting for everything from cookies to cupcakes!
How to make the best buttercream?
I could pretty much lick a bowl of this buttercream and be one happy woman. The addition of vanilla AND almond extract gives it a great flavor that we all love. It sets it apart from plain frosting.
It is important to only use gel or paste food dye
when making your frosting, because the liquid dyes will alter the consistency a surprisingly great deal. Liquid dye will take your luscious buttercream from the perfect consistency, to a runny consistency that won’t hold it’s shape in a quick hurry.
How to pipe buttercream?
I separate my batch of buttercream into 5 or 6 bowls and dye each bowl of frosting to my desired consistency. I have never found a dye that will get me a true red, so if you have any secrets for a rich Christmas red, I would love to hear them!
Grab your piping bags and decorating tips and you are ready to fill them up. I like to turn the bag half way inside out and set it in a tall glass. This makes it easier to scoop the buttercream into the bag if I am doing it along.
After your bags are filled it’s time to dream up all sorts of amazing designs for your cookies or cake that have the added bonus of tasting great!
More baked goods perfect with buttercream!
While we could eat buttercream right from the spoon, it’s probably best to serve it on a cake or cookie. Here are some other great recipe that you can use buttercream with.
- Fresh Strawberry Ombre Cake
- Frosted Sugar Cookies
- Pumpkin Cake Bars – Swap out the cream cheese frosting for buttercream
Perfect Piping Buttercream Recipe
Equipment
Ingredients
- 1 c. shortening butter flavored
- 1 c. butter
- 1 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
- 1/2 tsp. almond extract
- 7 1/2 c. powdered sugar
- 1/3 c. heavy whipping cream
- gel or paste icing dyes
Instructions
- In a large bowl, beat the shortening and butter until smooth and fluffy. Add the vanilla, almond extract and cream and mix until smooth.
- Add the powdered sugar 1-2 cups at a time, mixing well between each addition. Beat the frosting for an additional 4-5 minutes until light and fluffy.
- Using a toothpick, add the tiniest amount of dye at a time to the bowl of frosting to control your color. These dyes will color the frosting quickly, so there is no need to add too much.
Debi Mclachlan says
Hi, I am going to give this a try. I noticed that someone else from Australia mentioned Copha – this is something used to make chocolate crackles and it does hold the rice bubbles together, does this sound like the shortening you mention?
Danielle Green says
I googled Copha and it looks like that is the same as shortening!
Stacey says
Thanks!! I made it with all butter and just the vanilla and it tastes great! I haven’t started cake decorating yet, was making in advance.
2 follow up questions –
1) should i re-whip the icing out of the fridge or just let it warm up a little before icing the cake?
2) similar question, but regarding coloring it – I’m going to ice the cake white then want to color remaining icing to decorate… should i just fold the color in with a spoon or is it okay to re-whip?
Thanks! Rating a 5 as far as taste goes for now 🙂
Stacey says
Hi! My dad has a nut allergy so I wanted to leave out the almond extract. Should I sub with additional vanilla? Thanks!!
Danielle Green says
Yes, that’s what I would do.
Stacey says
Thanks!! I made it with all butter and just the vanilla and it tastes great! I haven’t started cake decorating yet, was making in advance.
2 follow up questions –
1) should i re-whip the icing out of the fridge or just let it warm up a little before icing the cake?
2) similar question, but regarding coloring it – I’m going to ice the cake white then want to color remaining icing to decorate… should i just fold the color in with a spoon or is it okay to re-whip?
Thanks! Rating a 5 as far as taste goes for now 🙂
Danielle Green says
I would re-whip it for the best result. As for the coloring, I often whip it in and it works great.
Natasa says
Hello, I would like to know what kind of ingredient is “shortening” and what kind of cream is “heavy shipping cream”?
Thank you 🙂
Natasa
Danielle Green says
Shortening is a vegetable fat used in baking. Heavy whipping cream is cream with a milk fat content of between 36 and 40 percent.
Joanna says
I was wanting to be sure if the butter should be at room temperature before mixing?
Danielle Green says
Yes, it’s best at room temperature!
Sande Dashiell says
Hi Daniell, I was wondering if you can use powder color with the same result?
Thank you for your he recipe
Sande
Danielle Green says
I’ve never used powder dyes but they should work they same because the pastes don’t add any liquid to the mixture.
Cheryl says
To get the Christmas shade of red I use Wilson food coloring, it comes in a little jar and you can get it at Walmart in the cake decorating section.
Cheryl says
To get the Christmas shade of red I use Wilson food coloring, it comes in a little jar and you can get it at Walmart in the cake decorating section.
Christine says
How much buttercream of this make? I need to Frost a two layer cake plus make rosettes around the sides of the entire cake.
Danielle Green says
This makes quite a bit of buttercream, around 6 cups. It should be enough for the project you are talking about.
Magda says
7 cups of sugar?!
Isn’t it too sweet?
Danielle Green says
Nope, this makes a big batch though.
Elise says
I made this buttercream and it tasted so good, the buttercream really is perfect for piping
Mary Clark says
I would like to know if this frosting hardens like royal icing?
Danielle Green says
No, not like royal icing. It does get a slight crust on the outside when piping designs that helps keep them intact, but definitely not hard like royal icing. This is a light and airy frosting.
Kristene Etwin says
This is the best buttercream frosting I’ve ever made and it pipes flowers, decorations perfectly. The mix of almond and heavy cream must help kill the shortening taste that usually turns me off to buttercream frostings. And the kids all noted the same! They usually don’t like buttercream but everyone enjoyed a couple bites of this one. Thank you for sharing!!
Jackie Austin says
To get a true red (or even black or rich brown), you can use powdered food coloring. I have always gotten them at a cake decorating supply, but you might be able to find on amazon.
Natalie says
Thank you for sharing this awesome recipe. I am new to pipping and this is a huge help.
Christina says
My normal cookie icing is great for outlining and flooding, and any small standard tip. But not so much for other tips, such as to make teddy bears furry. This icing is just what I needed for that.
I can say that shortening is a big no-no in my kitchen, so I just used 2 cups of butter, and it turned out fine. They are out on the counter drying now.
Also, I know you told another reader you use salted butter, but I read on another cookie blog that unsalted is better because the salt content (how much of which we don’t know) can alter the flavor of the cookies and icing. I’m not sure by how much, because I haven’t done a side by side comparison, but it seemed logical enough to me to switch to unsalted. Just food for thought 🙂
Next batch I’m going to try cononut oil in place of the shortening and see how it holds up.
Thanks for the recipe! Cheers!
Danielle Green says
I personally love salted sweets, so I opt for the salted. Some people are more conservative with salt and unsalted is perfectly fine in that case. Happy to hear this worked well for you!
Christina says
My normal cookie icing is great for outlining and flooding, and any small standard tip. But not so much for other tips, such as to make teddy bears furry. This icing is just what I needed for that.
I can say that shortening is a big no-no in my kitchen, so I just used 2 cups of butter, and it turned out fine. They are out on the counter drying now.
Also, I know you told another reader you use salted butter, but I read on another cookie blog that unsalted is better because the salt content (how much of which we don’t know) can alter the flavor of the cookies and icing. I’m not sure by how much, because I haven’t done a side by side comparison, but it seemed logical enough to me to switch to unsalted. Just food for thought 🙂
Next batch I’m going to try cononut oil in place of the shortening and see how it holds up.
Thanks for the recipe! Cheers!
Krissi cupcake danie says
Cornstarch is is something I add to my buttercream​ , it helps to hold the gel colors and will also help your pink and purple from changing ,
Sharon Baker says
I’ve made this recipe several times and it just isn’t as firm as I thought it would be. I’ll have to try the cornstarch.
Danielle Green says
I wouldn’t use cornstarch. Instead I would just add a little more powdered sugar.
Rosy says
Hi Danielle,
I’ve never used shortening flavored may I ask what do you use for this recipe?
Danielle Green says
You can use all butter instead of shortening if you don’t have access to shortening. It just may have a slightly looser consistency.
Dennis Auker says
Hi Danielle, I have been decorating Birthday cakes and wedding cakes for my kids and grandchildren for about 45 years now and and have always used this recipe with a little variance. Mainly milk rather than the whipping cream. It has always worked well and tasted great. I’ve used the almond or lemon flavors most of the time. I also add vanilla along with them some times to give it a little more mellow taste. I also have used the Carmel flavoring they use for coffee lattes and have had a good response to it.