It is important that the butter and all of the other ingredients have the same temperature to prevent the buttercream from splitting, so take the butter out of the fridge right away.
In a medium saucepan, prepare the pudding with the milk and sugar, according to the package instructions. Place the saucepan in a cold water bath and sprinkle the pudding’s surface with sugar to prevent a skin from forming (alternatively, press some cling film lightly against the pudding’s surface). Once cooled, stir the pudding until smooth. If there are any lumps, force it through a sieve.
When the butter and the pudding are both at room temperature, whip the butter for about 15 minutes. Once it has become white and fluffy, switch to the paddle attachment and add the pudding, about two tablespoons at a time, at low speed. Once all the pudding has been incorporated, stir in the vanilla extract and any liquor you’d like to add (up to 2 tablespoons).
Makes enough to cover and fill one 9-inch cake.
Tips:
If the buttercream should split, you can try heating (but not browning) a tablespoon of butter and quickly mixing it through the split buttercream.
To flavor the buttercream, you can use chocolate or fruit-flavored pudding mix, or you can add flavoring liquids to the finished buttercream. It holds up well to freshly squeezed fruit juice, cold coffe, and all kinds of liquor (rum is good). Add the liquids to taste but make sure you don’t use too much or the buttercream will not firm up enough.
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westmonster on 4.11.2012
Hi Matt!
First for the easier question: The cook and serve pudding I used didn’t have any sugar added in the mix, so I added sugar when I prepared it. If you use pudding mix with sugar in it already, you should in fact leave the extra sugar out, as you did correctly. If there was already sugar in your pudding mix, that would also explain why your heavier pudding mix packages call for the same amount of milk as my lighter, sugar-less pudding mix packets.
In short: The amount of milk I used is simply the amount indicated on the packaging of the pudding for normal preparation. So, when in doubt, I would suggest to use the amount of pudding mix needed for 4 cups of milk. And only add sugar if the pudding mix calls for it.
As for the splitting of the buttercream, I have one theory and one (hopefully helpful) tip: Theory: The pudding mix I used (Dr Oetker Vanilla Pudding; I was able to find it on amazon.com) consists mostly of corn starch. The starch is what ultimately binds the buttercream, afaik. I did a quick google search and found Jell-O pudding mix that lists sugar as the main ingredient. Maybe your buttercream split because the Jell-O brand pudding has less starch in it? You could try this recipe again using a pudding mix with no added sugar that lists corn starch as the main ingredient. Or you could try this with home-made starch-based pudding, if you had too much time on your hands.
Tip: Did you bring the cream back to room temperature before trying to mix it back together? It should be fine once all the ingredients have reached room temperature again and are mixed together long enough (at least a couple of minutes).
Sorry I can’t be of more help here. I haven’t had that problem before, but then I’ve only ever refrigerated the buttercream when it was already on the cake.
I hope you’ll make this again, successfully! Please let me know if any of my ideas work out.
Matt Miller on 4.6.2012
I travelled to Germany for about 6 weeks in the Summer of 1983 and again for my honeymoon in 1985 for 2 weeks. I loved the pastries and cakes there because they looked decadent, but were not so sickly sweet. I think this buttercream is the answer! Unfortunately, I did have a problem after I made it. It came together fine and I managed a crumb coat. Had to leave the house for about an hour, si I put my cake and the buttercream in the fridge. When I returned, the cake was fine, but the buttercream in the mixer bowl had separated. I tried to mix it back together without success. Also tried adding some warm melted butter and that didn’t work either. I resorted to a tub of chocolate store bought frosting to cover the crumb coat and that actually made an attractive presentation and tasted good, so turned out okay; however, I would like to make this recipe again. Should I have gone ahead and frosted the cake without refrigerating the buttercream? It was pretty soft, as the indredients were at room temp. Maybe I should have refrigerated the pudding a little before incorporating it into the whipped butter? Oh, one other question…the recipe calls for two 1.3 ounce packs of cook and serve pudding and 4 cups of milk. I found Jell-O brand 3 oz packages that call for 4 cups milk for the two packages. Was that a misprint or did I find the wrong thing? And I didn’t see instructions for when to add the sugar. The pudding didn’t call for it, so I left it out and it seemed fine.If your have any comments or suggestions, that would be great!