I recently made Mousseline from the CB and had some problems.  I know there are many threads discussing Mousseline, but I want to verify what I’m thinking and get some specific help.  I’m hoping I made a mistake and my results were not the way things should be.  I just thought the results were OK, especially the taste.  The Mousseline tasted really buttery, too buttery.  When I piped it, it seemed a little softer than photos of decorated cakes I’ve seen on this forum.  My ingredients were to the necessary temperatures and measured by weight. I’m wondering if I did something wrong when I heated the sugar.  I was a bit paranoid about doing something wrong.  I took it off of the heat when the thermometer registered a few degrees less than the needed temperature.  I thought I’d read on this forum that you should do this because the temperature will increase a little once removed from the heat.  Would the results I got be because the sugar temperature was off, either too cool or too hot?  Is there something else I could have done incorrectly to get these results?

By the way, I don’t have a photo of the cake to post.  Unfortunately, I was in a hurry and didn’t take a picture of it before I took it to the party.  The host put it on top of the refrigerator, but apparantly it wasn’t all of the way pushed back.  His partner opened the refrigerator and the cake completely fell over in the cake holder.  The result was not pretty, but I made a joke out of it so my daughter wouldn’t get too upset about her birthday cake being ruined.  Accidents happen.  Oh, well.  What can you do besides laugh?  All of those hours over a day and a half just to make a cake that could be featured on Cake Wrecks!

Mousseline does taste buttery and is soft for piping—you can pipe it beautifully with practice.  If you are used to icing made with confectioner’s sugar then you may have been surprised that mousseline is an entirely different type of icing. 

I can sympathize with your feeling like a day and a half was wasted with the cake falling off the top of the fridge.  I have had similar disasters that involve not pushing the cake far enough back on the counter so the dog can’t get to it.  Bummer.

So sorry about the cake falling off the fridge!  I hope your daughter wasn’t too disappointed.

I know people write about how mousseline is light and fluffy, but it is still buttercream, and is fairly dense and buttery.  Temperature will affect the consistency of the finished buttercream quite a bit, so cooler is better for piping.  If you’re going to pour the sugar syrup directly from the pan into the whipped whites, you might want to leave the thermomter in the pan so you can see what is happening with the temp.  After one or two times, if you consistently use the same burner setting, same pan, and same sized batch, you’ll know what will happen and won’t need to always leave the thermometer in the syrup.

The buttery taste- you didn’t use salt or salted butter, did you?  That makes it taste waaaay too buttery.

The only other thing is to add lots of flavorings- fruit curd or puree, liqueurs, chocolate, etc.  That helps a lot with both mouthfeel and taste.

Thanks for the replies.  The other icings I’ve made haven’t had this much butter.

I did use unsalted butter.  I wasn’t sure what liqueur to use for a subtle taste.  I did increase the amount of vanilla.  Also, I usually make my desserts for the family so kids are usually eating it, too.  I’m not overly concerned with the small amount of alcohol, but I don’t want an overwhelming taste or it won’t get eaten.  Do you have any suggestions of liqueurs?  I also make more chocolate cakes than yellow.  We tend to like things on the sweet side.  Do you think that adding more sugar might disguise some of the buttery taste.

avivaleah - 21 December 2010 09:09 PM

Do you have any suggestions of liqueurs? 

Frangelico pairs well with chocolate, will add to the sweetness, and won’t taste boozy.  Making the buttercream a day ahead will also mellow any tendency towards booziness.  You could also make white chocolate or dark chocolate mousseline. 

Do you think that adding more sugar might disguise some of the buttery taste.

There is a version in RHC which uses a little less butter (or a little more Italian meringue, depending how you look at it), it is the one with Miette’s Tomboy.  It was too sweet for me, but might be just right for you .  I have to be honest, though, to me it still tasted like buttercream, i.e., buttery.

Thanks for the suggestions, Julie.  What liqueur would you pair with a non-chocolate cake?  Do you think Frangelico would work well for this, too?  It’s funny.  My husband and I don’t really drink alcohol, but I have a collection of the hard stuff that I use when cooking and baking.