Hi bakers,

I am making a coconut sponge cake and I'm thinking an American style buttercream may be to heavy, ie. shortening, powder sugar, butter. I was looking at French buttercream with egg yolks and it sounds great but I'm worried about the heat and humidity of Texas. Anyone have experience with this? I never made a French buttercream, but have made boiled icing and that's only good for the day of and no good for heat. Any suggestions on icing choices?

Thx!

If it's going to be outside then you really need to stay away from the European buttercreams. I agree that a traditional American buttercream is too heavy. An Italian meringue buttercream or a French buttercream would be perfect if you could keep it cool.

An alternative is a hybrid between the two. It's Charlotte's Whipped Cream buttercream. You can use all shortening, all butter, or various ratios of the two. I know Leah_s uses high ratio shortening to keep it from melting down. It also cuts back on the greasiness if you use high ratio. Here's the link:

http://cakecentral.com/recipe/whipped-cream-buttercream-frosting

My only recommendation is do NOT use the Wilton meringue powder for this recipe, as it imparts a really sour flavor to the buttercream.