Finding the Perfect Frosting

Okay, so my son's first birthday is this month. I wanted to try to make his own cake but I know my culinary skills are not up to par, plus I don't have the time. Thanks Kroger for having my back on that one! I do want to make cupcakes though since, well, cupcakes are easy. You make the cupcake (from the box, I am no Betty Crocker) and then you can frost them in a matter of minutes. I think I can handle that. The thing is the frosting that comes in containers...not impressive. The last time I made a butter cream frosting it ended up tasting like sugared butter. Not tasty at all.

So, I have been doing my research and now and there are a couple different things that you can put in a butter cream frosting. I will be testing out multiple different things in my frosting to see which one tastes the best. To me, the best is Meijer like frosting. It is delish! For my first recipe I decided on simple recipe that I kind of made up myself. Don't let that mislead you though, it actually tasted good. Is it perfect? No, but it is tasty. It also did not taste like sugared butter and tears. That's a step in the right direction! Okay so here it is and I will go step by step on how I made it!

Ingredients:

1 cup Crisco shortening
1/2 cup butter (I choose real butter and did a stick)
4 cups powdered sugar
1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract (I choose the real stuff, not imitation)
1/3 cup half and half

It's pretty simple to do it just takes a little bit of time to throw it all together. First I started with the shortening and the butter at room temperature. I put them in a big bowl. 

 I creamed them together. Creamed is a fancy way of saying I blended them together. I started blending them at a lower speed then once they were blended pretty well I did a quicker speed. I blended it for 4 minutes. Yes, I know that is a lot of time but I really think its worth it. 

After that I added the vanilla in. Then I did more blending. You will be doing a lot of blending with this recipe.

After that I started blending in the powdered sugar, I blended it in 1/2 cup at a time. After each 1/2 cup I made sure to blend it in really well. It helps if you can use sifted powdered sugar. I personally didn't sift mine because I'm lazy. Oh and I don't have a sifter. So there's that. 

After all the powdered sugar is well blended you add in the half and half. I added it in a little at a time to make sure it was the consistency I wanted. 

I did end up adding a little bit more vanilla, half and half, and more powdered sugar to taste. I think I did a half cap-full more vanilla. I have no clue how much more half and half or powdered sugar I added. It was not very much though. If you wanted to add a little salt to make it not so sweet you can, I would only do a little bit and add it to the half and half and let it dissolve a little bit.  After it tasted pretty good to my standards I frosted my cupcakes. 

It frosted 24 cupcakes and I still had a cup or two left. I think it is plenty enough to frost a decent sized cake. If you wanted to color it add the food coloring at the very end. I hope you like this recipe. Let me know what you think!!

Peace and Love,