Skip to main content
Dessert

Butter Icing

A sweet icing made from butter, icing sugar, brandy, egg whites, and optional flavorings.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Butter and brandy are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,127 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity, wine. The science ↓

Butter Icing

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Cream the butter and icing sugar together.

  2. Add the brandy and mix until smooth and creamy.

  3. For white icing, sift the icing sugar and beat the egg whites until stiff.

  4. Gradually mix in the icing sugar until it holds its shape.

  5. Flavor with light-colored flavoring, citric acid, or blue food coloring if desired.

  6. For a simpler icing, mix boiling water with icing sugar to a nice consistency and flavor as above.

  7. Keep the icing moist by covering it with a damp cloth while using.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Butter + brandytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,127 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  2. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Brandy + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,340 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetoin (butter, cream).

  5. Brandy + sugartop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together11,939 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

Brandy and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 11,939 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Sweet butter
Adds richness and a smooth, creamy body to the icing.
Icing sugar
Provides sweetness and bulk, setting the icing's body as it is mixed in.
Egg whites
Beaten until stiff, they add lightness and help the white icing hold its shape.
Brandy
Adds flavor and liquid to loosen the creamed butter and sugar.

The step that matters

Gradually mix in the icing sugar until it holds its shape. Adding sugar too fast can make the icing stiff, grainy, or lumpy, while too little leaves it runny. Adding it slowly lets the sugar dissolve and the icing reach an even, spreadable consistency.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

You might also like

Brandy PeachesBrandy Peaches68 recipesBrandy CreamBrandy Cream21 recipesBrandy PuddingBrandy Pudding13 recipesWhite CakeWhite Cake431 recipes