Milk Chocolate Buttercream Frosting

I’ve been meaning to post more recipes for several weeks now, but life just got incredibly busy. I now have a backlog of recipes to start posting and today I will begin with the sweetest!

When I was a child, I rarely ate cake since I have a Chinese Mother and she didn’t like sweets. I remember her trying to bake cakes with recipes from her neighborhood friends but she never used frosting because she thought it was way too sweet.  I grew up thinking that cake was supposed to be served without frosting and my friend’s birthday cakes were strange with all that frosting on top.  That kind of frosting from a can made my teeth hurt!  That was before I had frosting made from scratch.  Whipped Cream frosting is still my favorite but a homemade Buttercream Frosting is really good too. 

Last month, it was my friend Kelly’s birthday and it occurred on the day of a class. So I made cupcakes for us all. I knew that her Mom used to make Yellow Cake with Chocolate frosting. I also know that her favorite kind of chocolate is Milk Chocolate so I made cupcakes from Gluten Free mix for Yellow Cake and surprised her with Milk Chocolate Buttercream Frosting.  It was delicious. And to satisfy the Dark Chocolate lovers, I grated Dark Chocolate over the frosted Cupcakes. I like to lightly frost cupcakes so there was plenty left to spoon into a bowl for those frosting lovers who spread it on the bottom half of their cupcakes. This recipe was a winner with Kelly and me!

Milk Chocolate Buttercream Frosting

4 – 5 ounces high quality Milk Chocolate

2 sticks unsalted Butter (8 ounces) at room temperature

2 ½ cups Powdered Sugar

¼ cup heavy Whipping Cream

½ teaspoon Vanilla Extract

Optional:  2 ounces Dark Chocolate grated or Chocolate Sprinkles

Place a heatproof bowl over a small pan of boiling water. Add in the Chocolate and stir with a spatula until melted.  Remove and set aside.

In a stand mixer or a large bowl with a hand mixer, put in the softened Butter and Powdered Sugar. Mix until light and fluffy.  Then add in the melted Chocolate, Whipping Cream and Vanilla Extract.  Mix until thoroughly combined. Use immediately or refrigerate and bring back to room temperature to frost cupcakes.

Once frosted, use a microplane grater and grate the Dark Chocolate on top of the frosted cupcakes.

Five Element Analysis

This is a very sweet dessert topping so you know that it belongs to the Earth Element and the Powdered Sugar and Milk Chocolate are the Earthy ingredients although the Chocolate also contributes some Fire.  The Butter, Whipped Cream and Vanilla Extract all belong to the Metal Element.  The Gluten Free Cake mix is primarily made of Rice Flour, which is also Metallic.  So be sure to serve these cupcakes after a meal that is composed of some Water and Wood foods and some Fire foods too.