This Clever Trick Helps Make Buttercream Bright White (While Still Using Real Butter)
You know the dilemma: You want that bright, bakery-shop-window-worthy, pure-as-the-driven-snow white frosting, but you want to use real butter and vanilla for superior flavor. Without switching to shortening (not as tasty) and clear vanilla extract (not as flavorful), you end up with pale yellow frosting rather than the perfectly bright-white option you were hoping for.
Turns out, there’s an easy trick that will give you the color you want without sacrificing flavor. While watching one of @petitecakery’s mesmerizing TikTok videos demonstrating a fluffy buttercream recipe, one tip really stood out: In the midst of beating together her ingredients, she adds a small amount of purple gel food coloring. “This just counteracts the yellowness of the butter, so when we get done, we’ll have that pretty white buttercream,” she says.
@petitecakery Everyone needs to make this at least once in their life. 🥰 #buttercream #cakedecorating #bakingbusiness ♬ love nwantinti (ah ah ah) – CKay
Wild, right? It takes me back to when we learned our primary and secondary colors. On a color wheel, yellow is directly opposite purple. Her frosting uses butter and vanilla, but is still a pristine white — so it seems to work! My gut tells me you’ll want to go easy on the food coloring to avoid an off-putting color; add a small dot to start, then mix before adding more if needed.
While I’m all about colorful frosting, sometimes you want that crisp, clean look to help your cake and other decorations stand out. I’ll definitely be trying the purple food-coloring trick, and I may have to give @petitebakery’s perfectly shiny and pipeable frosting recipe a try, too. You can even freeze it!