Vienna Cream Frosting (Better Than Cream!)

A thick creamy buttery frosting for your cakes. You can make it vanilla, chocolate, orange, lemon or coffee. Its a great topping that you can put some texture into. It looks very effective. Definitely best to have butter out of the fridge for about an hour before required-it's easier to beat butter that is not hard. The butter should not be melted. This recipe should easily ice 12 -16 cupcakes with piped icing tops. This recipe uses Australian Cup measurements-1 cup = 250ml & 1 tablespoon =20ml

• Ready In: 15 mins
• Serves: 12-16

Ingredients

• 1⁄4 lb butter, chopped (125 grams)
• 1 3⁄4 cups icing sugar, 280 grams (powdered confectioners sugar)
• 2  tablespoons milk

Directions

1. Beat the butter in a small bowl with an electric mixer. You need to beat it for a fair length of time -until it is as white as possible.
2. Gradually beat in half of the sugar, all the milk and then the remaining sugar.
3. If you would like the mixture thicker- add in some extra icing sugar one spoonful at a time until the consistency is right. If the mixture is too thick- gradually (and I mean gradually) add in some more liquid until the consistency is achieved.).
4. VARIATIONS:
5. To make it chocolate- add in 2 or 3 tablespoons of cocoa with the sugar and a little extra milk if required.
6. Coffee- add 3 teaspoons of instant coffee in 2 tablespoons of hot water(omit the milk).
7. Lemon- substitute lemon juice for the milk. You can also add in some lemon zest.
8. orange- use orange juice in place of the milk.
9. Different colours/flavours- add food colouring and flavours of your choice (in place of some liquid in the recipe).
10. For pink I add some rosewater and a few drops of cochineal.