Amazing Not-Too-Sweet Cream Cheese Icing

Computer Board Brownie Birthday Cake...

...Carrot Cake Cupcake...

...Red Velvet Cupcakes... 

...a little Red Velvet Birthday Cake...

...Big Red Velvet Birthday Cake...

...and a slice of that big ol' Red Velvet Birthday Cake...

What do all these cakes have in common? (Aside from the fact most of them are Red Velvet...)

You know it! Cream Cheese Icing... which is, basically, the bestest, most yummiest kind of frosting in the world... along with all the other kinds of frosting, off course!

Now, the problem a lot of people have with frosting is that it is really, really sweet... a direct result of all the icing sugar needed to make it stiff and fluffy... and not just butter or cream cheese with a bit of vanilla stirred in.

You'll often see question in the comments section "But *insert type of frosting here* is really sweet and it hurts my teeth... is there any way to make it less sweet?" and the answer is often "No - it's sweet because of the icing/confectioner's/powdered sugar... and you need all that sugar to get the right texture for the frosting"...

But... there is something else in your pantry with a very similar texture to icing sugar... and it isn't sweet... what I'm thinking of is... CORNFLOUR!!! (also know as cornstarch, I believe?)

Now, I'm not saying I'm the first to come up with this theory... but as far as I came up with it all by myself. :) And it really works for me! I just take out one 1/4 of the icing sugar the frosting recipe calls for and sub in that same quantity of cornflour... et voila! Frosting with the same texture you need but not as sweet as you dread...

I wouldn't sub any more than a quarter of the sugar for flour because then you start to taste it a little bit, which is kinda average. But a 1/4 or less and you have the same taste, only less sweet. Excellent!

Read on for my converted recipe for cream cheese icing...

EDIT: I have successful used this method for buttercream frosting too!

Red Velvet Comparison

Mostly, I am a student making do with a student flat. But sometimes, I am a daughter luxuriating in the comforts of Home.

Here, I have a photo comparison of two Red Velvet Cakes. The recipe comes, as ever, from about.com and the only things I changed were to, again - as ever, halve the amount of sugar and change the "shortening" for butter.

This first one I made at my flat, last year... I baked it for a dessert party I didn't quite make it to... I even bought the buttermilk especially for it! (I made yummy pancakes with the leftover buttermilk!) It was moist, chocolatey, red and delicious. The icing, guiltily from a can (it was on special...) has put me off ever purchasing the trans-saturated goop ever again, but hey! On top is melted chocolate and jelly crystals.

So although the cake itself was yummy enough to convince me that I definitely wanted to make it again - I wanted a slightly more chocolatey effect and definitely wanted to do my own icing...

Enter the Indian Red Velvet Frisbee - where I experimented with a different recipe... And ended up with a practically deep fried disc - which our hostess gamely tried to revive by serving it in a banoffee-type trifle, but really it was beyond redemption and I was too disheartened to photograph it.

Upon returning home - I had my 20th Birthday all over again (2.0) and I really wanted a Red Velvet Cake that worked! So, I returned to about.com added a little extra cocoa, halved the sugar and made my own icing... The result? Possibly the best cake I've ever eaten... And here it is!

Moist, sticky, even more chocolately, deep blood red - and that cream cheese with vanilla bean icing? To die for! Yum! Guess what kind of cake I'm having for my 21st...

The biggest difference between flat-cake and home-cake was the affordability of ingredients. And with a whole bottle of red food colouring in it - Red Velvet Cake is never gonna be a budget friendly cake. But as a Birthday blow-out, about.com's Red Velvet Cake recipe is a reliable show stopper.

Stay tuned for flat-friendly cakes to come....