Buttercream Frosting Recipe: How to Make French Buttercream

Buttercream is a category of thick, creamy frostings made with a generous amount of butter. Vanilla buttercream frosting is ubiquitous, but other flavorings are easy to incorporate—such as a chocolate buttercream made with cocoa powder for frosting a chocolate cake. You can also add food coloring to buttercream frosting recipes to decorate festive cakes and desserts.

The terms “frosting” and “icing” are often used interchangeably, but frosting is generally thicker and fluffier than icing, which tends to set quickly and harden when dry. Icing recipes typically consist of confectioners’ sugar mixed with a liquid, such as milk or heavy whipping cream. Icing is not spreadable like frosting—instead, it’s poured, spooned, or drizzled over baked goods like sugar cookies, cinnamon buns, and hot cross buns. There's no such thing as buttercream icing—buttercream is thick and fluffy. If you need to cover an entire cake, opt for a smooth, thick frosting and use an offset spatula.

Different methods of making buttercream yield varying textures and levels of creaminess. Find the best buttercream frosting recipe for your favorite cake recipe or next baking project:

1. 1. French buttercream: French buttercream involves making a sugar syrup, then mixing the hot sugar syrup into beaten egg yolks. Using an electric mixer, slowly add softened butter until the frosting reaches the desired consistency. The egg yolks give this buttercream a rich flavor and yellow color. Traditionally, this type of buttercream fills the layers of dacquoise, a French meringue cake.
2. 2. German buttercream: This style of buttercream starts with making a vanilla custard with whole milk and eggs. Using a hand mixer or a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment beat the butter until it’s light and fluffy. To finish, slowly add the custard to the butter. German buttercream is a very creamy, rich, dairy-forward buttercream that also makes an excellent base for cream cheese frosting.
3. 3. Italian meringue buttercream: Buttercream frosting is one of the most popular applications of Italian meringue. To make Italian meringue, add hot sugar syrup to beaten egg whites, and turn it into buttercream by simply adding butter. As the most heat-stable of the buttercream frostings, Italian buttercream is ideal for frosting celebration layer cakes, like wedding cakes or birthday cakes that might spend hours at room temperature.
4. 4. Swiss meringue buttercream: Like Italian buttercream, Swiss buttercream starts with making a meringue. To make Swiss meringue, you beat egg whites with sugar over hot water and add the butter bit by bit. Swiss meringue buttercream is relatively quick to make and yields impressive results.
5. 5. American buttercream: The method for making American buttercream, also known as quick buttercream, involves mixing confectioners' sugar (aka powdered sugar or icing sugar) with butter and sometimes milk or heavy cream—no heat, no eggs. Some pastry chefs don't consider this type of frosting buttercream since it is not very creamy.