American Baker in Germany

We've gone over American buttercream, Swiss meringue buttercream, I've tried Italian meringue buttercream. But what about German buttercream? Don't I live in Germany? Well, let me tell you my experience with Germany buttercream so far. I knew what it was long before I tasted it or tried to make it. I tasted it later in a bakery cake. It's lovely. Light and not very sweet. Very creamy. Almost a whipped cream feel to it with a buttery aftertaste. So how is it made? It's basically a pudding or custard base mixed with butter. Hearing that, it sounds super easy. So, I made my own recipe for homemade vanilla pudding, chilled it in the fridge, and whipped it with butter. No problem. And... my buttercream separated and I couldn't get it to come back together to save my life. I thought then that I couldn't make German buttercream. Turns out, you can't just throw things together making your own recipe. So, I decided to try a recipe that was actually made to ma

This cake is part of our series in how to dress up a sheet cake. Back to school this year is special since it will be the first time some children will have gone to school for nearly six months due to COVID-19. I wanted to make it special. I started out with some vegan American buttercream and I put some in two bowls coloring one black and the other brown.  I frosted the top of my sheet cake with black buttercream.  Then I frosted the sides with brown.  I put the rest of the brown buttercream in a piping bag with a ribbed, flat piping tip.  Then I piped a line around the edges of the cake.  The lines overlapped a bit and I piped another, shorter line if there were any gaps.  Then I put away the buttercream and got out the fondant. I rolled out some white fondant and cut out the letters to spell Back to School, ABC and 123.  Then I placed the Back to School in the middle of the cake.  ABC and 123 diagonally in the corners of the cake.  Then I rolled out s

This may be the longest title ever, but these are, in my opinion, the equipment you will need if you are interested in cake decorating and want to try piping. The first one: piping bags. This one is a disposable piping bag. Piping bags are triangular shaped bags used to hold buttercream for piping. You can buy disposable piping bags by the 100's for reasonable prices.  This is a reusable piping bag. It should have an opening the right size for your coupler that usually comes with a set, but in my opinion, these are not strictly necessary. However, you will need either disposable or reusable piping bags if you want to pipe.  An off-set spatula. I'm showing two different ones. You won't necessarily need two, but you will need one for sure. The off-set angle allows you to smooth the buttercream on the top of a cake without dragging your hand or the handle of your spatula through it.   Of course, you will need some piping tips. I'm going to go through several siz