What is Browned butter?
Basically it’s butter that you’ve cooked! In the process all the milk solids in the butter become caramelized and impart a nutty depth of flavor that can only be described as intoxicating. To make it add butter to a small pot and cook on low heat stirring occasionally. That’s it! Transfer to a bowl once it’s browned to a nice golden color. If you haven’t browned butter before you’ve got to try! Cooking it adds a depth of flavor, intensified nuttiness and this incredible aroma. Browned butter enhances both sweet and savory dishes, you’re going to be hooked!
How do You Make Italian Meringue Buttercream??
Watch the video above to see ALL the steps to make creamy, dreamy Italian meringue buttercream!
About the Decorating
First of all, you don’t have to pipe buttercream orchids and all that, just stop at the crumb coat and get to eating, it’s just delicious and I love seeing all the flecks from the vanilla beans and caramelized butter bits. If you are piping the flowers I recommend storing them in the fridge or freezer while you get everything together so they can be handled without crushing them. If you find cake decorating to be a bit intimidating then check out my How to Decorate a Cake post, it has lots of helpful tips and a full how to video.
Can you see all the browned butter and vanilla bean flecks in the buttercream and cake??? Also I gotta say, love the color scheme and especially the green and brown I got by using match cocoa powder for the buds and stem.
Some Tips and Pointers
I should mention that I ordered two piping tips for this cake that made a huge difference, they’re shaped like curved tear drops and are a total game-changer, 120 and 127. You can use there to make many different types of petals and I highly recommend them. If you’re not using 6-inch pans, double the recipe for 8-inch pans or triple the recipe for 9-inch pans. If you see little clumps of butter after you mix the wet ingredients don’t panic, it all works out by the time you mix in the dry ingredients. You can even use melted butter and warm the milk and sour cream up a bit if you like. You can substitute whole milk yogurt for the sour cream if desired, I do it all the time and can’t really tell the difference. To get FLAT layers that are moist inside and out try using cake strips! You can buy a set on the shop page or make your own from foil and paper towels at home. I made a whole blog post on it so check it out if you’re interested!
Steps to Make This Cake
If you’ve tried this cake then don’t forget to rate the recipe and let me know how you got on in the comments below, I love hearing from you!
If you love this recipe try these out!
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