This is a basic recipe that allows you to make the choice of how sweet it is. Top cupcakes and muffins and especially chocolate zucchini cakes with this icing.

Basic Chocolate Buttercream Icing

butter,

cocoa powder, divided

milk

vanilla extract

(16 confectioners' sugar, sifted

Beat butter and 1/4 cup cocoa powder together in a bowl with an electric mixer on low until light and fluffy. Gradually add milk, remaining 1/4 cup cocoa powder, and vanilla extract; beat until smooth. Add confectioners' sugar, about 2 tablespoons at a time, until desired consistency is reached.


Perfect! I doubled the recipe for a 2-layer round cake and had some leftover. Didn't use all the powdered sugar, added a little extra milk (whole milk) for consistency, and used salted butter. Big hit for the 4-year old's birthday cake!

Easy recipe to follow For me, I found it having a chalky aftertaste on the tongue It was the cocoa powder despite using Hershey’s I’ve never had this aftertaste with a vanilla buttercream so I am doubting it was the confectioner’s sugar Next time I will use a recipe that uses melted unsweetened chocolate

Good recipe but definately add the salt or it will be too sweet. Also I found I had to add extra milk to thin it a bit. Make sure you mix for a few minutes.

We used this frosting on top of a yellow cake and it was amazing! I would definitely recommend putting a little bit of salt to the frosting and letting it sit for a little bit before you frost a cake.

This icing was not like a glaze. When adding liquid to make frosting never add it all at once slowly add till it,s the right consistency. It was a very good Icing , if you,ve made icing before there should not have been a problem. the sweetness is up to you less sweat by using less sugar. make sure to beat it at least to five minutes. very good Icing.

Definitely salted butter, and I found one batch might not be enough. Still Amazing!

This gave me the perfect consistency I wanted!

Having baked my cake early in the day I then set the needed butter out to come to room temperature. A few hours later I easily combined all the ingredients in my Kitchen Aid. The frosting came together very nicely, but, after using almost the entire box of confectionary sugar I felt that it was becoming sweet enough. (I'll guess-timate that I left about four tablespoons in the box.) Then, when I went to frost my nine inch two layer cake I found the chocolate mixture to be very stiff and even with applying it gently I was still pulling up some pieces of cake. So, before I went any further I added two more tablespoons of milk and incorporated that thoroughly into my mixture. The sweetness was evened out and the texture was just right for spreading. I had enough to generously frost in-between my two layers, the sides and top of the cake with a fair amount left over. All in all the taste was very good, I just think the proportions are slightly off on the amount of sugar and milk needed. It is good to know that you don't actually have to use the entire sixteen ounces of sugar yet there will still be plenty of frosting for even three nine inch layers.

It was much more buttery than I'm used to, but it was pretty good - my mom liked it the most, though, haha. If I make it again in the future, I would use less butter, but that's just my personal taste. Overall, a brilliant recipe!

This was an okay buttercream. Simple enough but not specific enough. I would tweak the recipe next time.

Very good icing. I only used about 1/2 of the confectioner's sugar. Good spreading consistency and not too sweet.

This is my favorite recipe !! I made this with nesquick instead of powdered sugar and unsweetened chocolate powder and it worked just as well it tasted amazing

Very good.  Thanks to other reviews, I adjusted slightly. Really need to cream/beat for quite some time to get it to the right consistency. Used cream rather than milk and had to use a little bit more than noted here, also added a bit of gran marnier as well - really changed the flavour to something a little more "grown up".  Added a pinch of salt.  Very sweet but the gran marnier and the salt helped quite a bit.  I'd use this again.

I love this recipe because it is so versatile.You can use it with almost anything and just tailor it to your needs.

This recipe is very easy and delicious. Not hardly enough to cover two layers though.

Definitely need to double recipe but absolutely delicious!  So light and fluffy!

Just added more Chocolate but other than than, its a good recipe!           You cant go wrong!

It came out very rich and chocolaty but a little more runny than I expected. My family it no matter and requested more, I’ll use it again and tweak it just a bit.

It was a hit! I’m making it again this week!

I love this icing.  It turns out perfect every time.  Extremely easy.

I ended up having to add a lot more sugar to get it to a frosting consistency and it was still a tiny bit runny. It does however taste amazing so I'm willing to believe that I might have messed up somehow.

Very easy, mighty quick and super delicious!

It was a very very good chocolate flavor. Everyone at work wants more.

We ended up using a lot less powered sugar and it was awesome. Misifn

Pretty good.  too much vanilla for my taste.  I make my own vanilla so it is pretty strong.

Added 10 oz confectioners' sugar and it was easy to spread, creamy, but not as tooth achingly sweet.

Will for sure make again!! Made recipe as written and it went wonderfully on brownies!! Trying on a yellow cake next!!

Lovely deep cocoa flavor! My teenage son decided to bake his 1st cake &amp; made this to go on top. Super yummy! I had him add a teeny pinch of salt, which I think helps the overall flavor. We’ll make this on again!

It was a great taste but...
it was a false recipe. It wasn't frosting. I don't know what it was but it certainly  was not frosting! It was more of a glaze. I will not be using this recipe ever again! Plus it was way to sweet.

I  began exactly as written. I quickly realized that it wouldn't be enough to frost a double layer cake, so I doubled the recipe. Nearing the end of mixing it still didn't look like enough so I continued to add the ingredients in the proper ratios until I got to where I felt I had enough. Guessing somewhere between triple and quadruple the original recipe. Ended up having just enough to frost a double layer, 9" round cake. Maybe 2 or 3T  leftover.

Maybe it was because I had to keep adding, but it wasn't very chocolatey. More powdered sugary than anything.. Ended up melting a Hershey dark chocolate bar and mixing that in too. 

All in all, it turned out okay, but probably will not use this recipe again.

basic chocolate buttercream icing

Prep Time: 10 minutes

Total: 10 minutes

Servings: 16

Cost: $1.64 /serving

Author : Kaley

Ingredients

Instructions

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