Frosting

I'm a month out from Ellie's birthday, and I'm on to planning my desserts. I am trying out various gluten-free baking mixes in search of the right AP Flour blend, and the best cake mix. Can't have cake without FROSTING, so I'm also working out the perfect recipe to go on my little cakes.

My options so far are:
Plain buttercream
Italian Meringue buttercream
Marshmallow frosting

The first is easy, peasy. The other two require cooking, and boiling sugar, and fear. But, they're also likely to be incredibly delicious, and that's how I like to roll.

 I want something that's going to pipe well, and I have a sneaking suspicion it's going to be the Meringue that wins out. Going to try all three, though, and let my taste buds do the talking.

I've also decided to make chocolate meringues, because they're delicious, and fill them with my favourite (new) chocolate cream cheese frosting. .5c chocolate cream cheese .5c butter, 2 c icing sugar!

Today we tried the plain buttercream on a fresh strawberry, gluten free cupcake. My apologies for the crappy cell phone photo! My guest liked the icing, as did the minions, but I think it was a little too sweet. My recipe called for .5c softened butter, 3 and a bit cups icing sugar, two teaspoons vanilla extract, and 2 tablespoons heavy cream.

Marshmallow Frosting Attempt #1: complete failure. BIG mess.

Marshmallow Frosting Attempt #2: less of a mess, still a failure. I give up!