I have a 14" square due for next Saturday and it must be covered in white buttercream. The customer wants a black stencil work on the sides. I'm comfortable stenciling on fondant but haven't tried it on buttercream. If I'm not fondanting a cake I usually use a SMBC but I doubt that would support a stencil. What do you amongst you who do stencil work use for the buttercream base? Am I correct in assuming it must be a crusting BC? If so, which is your favourite recipe? Thank you in advance for all your help, comments, and suggestions.

I've done stencil on sugarshacks buttercream and cream cheese icing. It needs to be a hard surface to stencil so refrigerate it until hard, should only be around 30 minutes. I use the same buttercream to stencil that I used on the cake. Should work fine.

Not sure if I'm allowed to do this but here's a link to a YouTube tutorial on the exact thing. HTH

Teresa

http://www.youtube.com/user/dtdonnahoo?feature=mhee#p/a/u/1/URr0z9GMbk0

thank you both. The stenciling part doesnt scare me...it's getting the right BC. I'll try Sugarshacks BC on a test cake tomorrow. You've been a great help.

I use the Wilton Recipe straight up and it works great

I use my crusting butter cream. 2 pounds powdered sugar, 1 1/2 cups hi ratio shortening, 1/2 cup butter salted, 1/3 cup water or non dairy flavored coffee creamer, 2 tablespoons clear vanilla. I also refrigerated each tier before adding the stencil. Make sure you thin down your butter cream to the correct consistency before you try the stencil. I try it out on a piece of cardboard before applying to the cake especially when using dark colors to stencil with.

Thinking of giving stencils a try also- fingers crossed

Well, I tried my hand at stenciling on buttercream but confess that I just couldn't face any more crusting American buttercream. I support the ban on transfats so it seemed hypocritical to use high ratio shortening and while debi's crisco buttercream doesnt taste too bad, I really prefer mousseline. I frosted a test cake with mousseline and popped it in the fridge for about 30 min. to firm it up. Then I placed the stencil against the side of the cake and spread on black mousseline with a bench scraper. I lifted the stencil and, bob's your uncle, a pretty good stencil work. Easy peasey and I don't know why it took me so long to try. I'm having trouble loading pictures to the gallery but if you care to see for yourself, here's my flickr page

http://www.flickr.com/photos/66872984@N04/

The hi ratio we get in CA is trans fat free and it works the same. You can't get the regular stuff in CA anymore it was banned. I still prefer American crusting butter cream because you get a smoother cake base to start with before adding your stencil.

The hi ratio we get in CA is trans fat free and it works the same. You can't get the regular stuff in CA anymore it was banned. I still prefer American crusting butter cream because you get a smoother cake base to start with before adding your stencil.