Painting with buttercream isn’t exactly like regular painting, but it’s not hard if you know the right techniques!
I’ve got five tips for you to make your buttercream painting go smoothly (is there a pun in there?). But before I dive into those tips, I want to answer a few basic questions.
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Buttercream Painting Basics
First of all, this post is all about painting on buttercream with (more!) buttercream. There are other edible paints you can use, and I talk all about them in this post:
Second, you might be wondering if you need to use a certain type of buttercream for painting. While I prefer Swiss or Italian meringue buttercream, you can definitely use any kind of buttercream you like for painting. I’ve seen many beautiful cakes painted with American buttercream, and I’m sure other kinds would work just as well.
Painting isn’t a very structural technique (like say, piping flowers would be) so you don’t have to worry about the buttercream being sturdy.
Finally, you might be wondering what tools to use for painting. I use a set of regular paint brushes that I keep only for food, and also a small metal palette knife. I bought all of these things at my local craft store. You don’t have to get anything special, but I would recommend avoiding the cheapest brushes because they tend to shed hairs.
Alright, now that the basics are out of the way, here are my five tips for painting with buttercream:
Tip 1: Start with a well-chilled cake.
Before painting your cake, you need to create a blank canvas to work on. I typically start with a crumb coat, then follow with a final layer of frosting to even things out.
Once I’m happy with the final layer of frosting, I let the cake chill in the fridge until the buttercream is completely solid. it usually takes 20-40 minutes for everything to firm up, depending on how warm the kitchen is.
The buttercream needs to be firm enough that you can touch the cake without leaving a mark. This makes it way easier to paint, because you can actually press your paintbrush or palette knife onto the cake without messing up that base layer of frosting.
Once the buttercream is cold, you can begin painting, Keep an eye on the frosting though: if it starts to soften as you’re painting, you might need to return the cake to the fridge for a bit.
While working on a chilled cake is great for keeping the base frosting smooth, there is one caveat. When the cake is chilled, anything you paint on will start to firm up quickly. You won’t be able to spread your buttercream paint around like you would with normal paint, so make sure you’re confident with your paint placement!
Tip 2: Use the back of a sheet tray and a palette knife to mix small amounts of color.
Painting a cake doesn’t’ usually require a whole lot of buttercream. So naturally if you’re using lots of different colors, you ‘ll only need a very small amount of each. But how to mix up such small amounts?
The best way I’ve found is to mix small amounts of color on the back of a sheet tray or another flat surface. It’s kind of like a makeshift artist’s palette.
I like to use either my offset spatula or a palette knife to mix all the colors on the back of one sheet tray. It’s easier to mix small portions this way, and I think it’s also easier to pick up or scrape off the buttercream as you paint.
Tip 3: Use gel food coloring.
If you want really bright or vivid colors, you’ll want to use gel food coloring, not the liquid kind. And that’s even more true when working with really small amounts of buttercream. My favorite brand is Americolor, but other brands work as well.
Liquid colors aren’t concentrated enough, so they’ll end up watering down your buttercream before you get much color.
If you’d like to learn how I color my buttercream, including how to mix really dark or vivid colors, I have all that info available in my free course Color Like a Pro.
In Color Like a Pro I go over the basic science of meringue-based buttercreams, demo how to mix colors, and show you how to use color theory to match exact colors.
Click here to sign up for the free course.
Tip 4: Use a soft, spreadable consistency buttercream to paint.
This tip goes hand in hand with working on a chilled cake. You’ll want to make sure the buttercream you’re painting with has a soft, spreadable consistency.
For Swiss meringue buttercream, that means you want to keep it slightly warmer.
If you’re using an American style buttercream with powdered sugar, you might want to try adding just a tiny bit more milk or cream to your buttercream.
Either way, you want to make sure the buttercream is nice and soft and spreadable. A softer buttercream will give you more time to paint before it starts to set up on the chilled cake.
Tip 5: Be mindful of how colors will mix on the cake.
Let me tell you, this is something I’ve learned from past experience! If you plan to layers different colors but don’t want them to mix, make sure the first layer is cold before painting on the next layer.
For this cake with lots of color layers, I stopped several times and put the cake back into the fridge. Then I could paint the lighter colors over the dark blue without and mixing.
Note: if you’re using American buttercream, it might be possible to layer colors without chilling. American buttercream starts to form a crust after a while, so that might be enough to keep colors from mixing. I can’t say for sure since I haven’t used it myself, but just be aware that crusting could affect how your painting goes.
Of course if you want the colors to mix, then don’t stop to chill the cake in between! You can create fun watercolor effects by allowing colors to blend together as you paint.
P.S. Check out the artists who inspired these cake designs:
- Roma Osowo – https://www.instagram.com/p/Bs5wKB_jN3J/
- Josie Lewis of Josie Lewis Art – https://www.instagram.com/p/B73hvZXJwV1/
- Jessi Raulet of EttaVee – https://www.instagram.com/p/B0_DnlWo-9B/
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