# Whipped topping recipe needed for wedding cake



## nsmoritz (Aug 11, 2008)

Hello, this is my first true post to the site. I am making a wedding cake for my friends wedding and she wants a whipped topping. Normally this would be okay, however it is an outdoor wedding in San Diego...next month! It will be quite warm. 

I have tried adding piping gel and gelatin to my whipped cream and it does make it hold shape a little more but it still tends to deflate in a short amount of time outside.

I have suggested buttercream but she doesn't want anything to sweet and rich. Does anyone know a recipe for a non-dairy whipped cream or a whipped topping recipe that I can try that might hold up. I would also be interested in a buttercream recipe that is not too sweet and doesn't use a lot of shortening.

Any help is appreciated. I have searched the internet and I am still at a loss.

Thank you!!!


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## m brown (May 29, 1999)

Try half Riches Whipped Topping mix (or Ready Whip or any other commercial liquid whipped topping) and half fresh heavy cream.
You can also add gelatin, 1 Tbl to each 2qts of cream.
Make sure you properly bloom and dissolve the gelatin.


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## siduri (Aug 13, 2006)

1. You might want to experiment with mixing italian meringue with whipped cream and some gelatin. 
2. Or italian meringue and cream cheese 
3. I also would highly recommend the white chocolate cream cheese buttercream as described by rose beranbaum in the cake bible. I make it without the butter, just beating up the cream cheese and adding vanilla and melted white chocolate (which not only adds sweetness, a certain creaminess (no chocolate taste, just a subtle hint of something) but also keeps it sturdy. 
4I never had success with it because it always curdled for me, but perhaps that's because all the recipes i tried called for a food processor which i don;t have, but what about *white chocolate ganache* - ganache can tolerate the heat.


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## nsmoritz (Aug 11, 2008)

Thank you for the advice. I will try the gelatin again and see how that works. 

I have always wondered what was used at professional bakeries for whipped topping on wedding cakes.

Thank you very much!


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## nsmoritz (Aug 11, 2008)

Thank you for your input. Would the meringue melt or sweat? I know when I make Lemon Meringue it tends to sweat when it is at room temperature. I will definitely try it. 

I really want the cake to hold up and be what she wants. I have done baby and wedding showers but this is my first wedding and for a friend....so I have some experimenting ahead of me!! 

Thank you so much!!


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## siduri (Aug 13, 2006)

I don;t have time to post it now, but you need to look up "meringue italienne" or "italian meringue" - its made by boiling sugar and water to the soft ball stage, meanwhile beating egg whites till stiff - when the sugar is at the right temp, you slowly pour it into the beaten whites, beating all the while. This makes a very stable meringue, that stays soft. it';s actually a great frosting in itself - fluffy and not too sweet, and no butter at all. Or you add butter, to the quantity you want, and it's a soft and lighter buttercream. But i often mix it with other things, like with mascarpone to make a much better tiramisu', or with whipped cream to make a really soft ice cream, or just as a frosting, or to mix with pastry cream to make a soft and lovely filling for cream puffs. Since the syrup cooks the egg whites, you can eat it as it is. You don';t bake it like lemon meringue pie. 
On its own, it isn;t great for decorating because though stable, it doesn;t make crisp lines and shapes with the decorating points. You can pipe a border, but it isn;t crisp-looking and it;s hard to smooth it to make a good base. But i'm guessing that mixed with cream cheese you might be abgle to achieve this, or maybe with white chocolate. 
But i get the impression you're not that experienced with baking, and you may have a hard time figuring out the proportions to use. I'd just experiment, a little by eye, but i've been using this meringue for many many years now and have a feel for it. Maybe someone can help me out here?


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## nsmoritz (Aug 11, 2008)

Thank you for the info on the italian maringue. I am actually an avid baker with a few awards under my belt, however I do lack experience with italian meringue.

For cakes I have generally used buttercream, cream cheese, chocolate (buttercream and cream cheese), whipped cream and ganache.

Since the cake was going to be outside and at the time of the year it will be about 80+ degrees out so I was worried about whipped topping melting or deflating. Since it is a wedding it will need to sit out for a few hours in the shade before serving.

My friend likes the smoothness and simplicity without too much sweetness in the whipped cream but I was worried about weather taking its toll.

The meringue sounds like an excellent idea. Through some trial and error I will test out a cake with the meringue and then try some regular whipped cream with the gelatin added again and set them out and see what happens....:lips:

Thank you so much for your input!


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## siduri (Aug 13, 2006)

OK, sorry, i didn;t realize you had experience with baking, just not with ital. meringue (I was worried, actually, that you were doing a wedding cake without the experience!) 

I can give you some of my own experience. I did my daughter's wedding cake a couple of years ago, in Rome, in July, it was 100 degrees, no air conditioning in the house and the place where the reception was held was outside, albeit in the evening (but it MAY have gone down to 85 by midnight). It was 3 tiers, 6 layers, chocolate butter cake (cake bible recipe) and had dark chocolate raspberry ganache between some layers (which held up very well) and white chocolate cream cheese buttercream with raspberry reduction between the other. The crumb coating was white chocolate buttercream. (It held up fine, despite the heat, and though i did;t decorate with it, i think i could have - the white chocolate really firms it up but it stays soft and fluffy). On top of that i put home made rolled fondant. Unexpectedly, due to the heat, the tiers were sliding around like crazy - had to drive a dowel through all tiers, and then put toothpicks around the edges of the layers because they were still unstable - frosted over them with royal icing borders and told the caterer to remove them before serving. 

I made it during the week prior to the wedding, and put the various layers in the (small italian) freezer as i made them - my mixer is not big enough to make more than two at a time. Then i put in the filling between each of two layers, and froze those. I had to clear out the fridge (small italian fridge) on the day before the wedding so i could assemble tiers and then re-refrigerate it all together, though if i had had a big freezer, i would have frozen it instead. Then we brought it to the place the night before the wedding, where it sat in their fridge until the buffet had been served, and was brought out as people ate their meal. Stayed out two hours or so.

I'd stay away from whipped cream, unless you intend to keep it refrigerated except for a couple of hours, even if you stabilize it with gelatin. I've done that but not for something so important that has to be out and admired for a long time. Or have you tried it and it worked in the heat? You can always do some trial runs. Ganache is great and holds up even in the heat (up to a couple of hours), and would work, but if you want white you'd have to do white chocolate ganache, and as i said, i never could make it where it didn;t curdle.

I would go with the white chocolate cream cheese. It's not rich and doesn;t taste of chocolate, and you can have the bride taste it without telling her what it is. 

And i would try mixing part of that with (cooled) italian meringue, which might make it fluffier. Then I'd set them both out decorated on a cardboard, in the heat, and see how tyhey hold up. 

You can also always do the decorations on top of that with another frosting, like buttercream or royal icing, so tehy maintain their shape. The important thing is that the frosting of the cake is soft and not too rich, right? 

And if you're really good with smoothing frosting and can get a professional touch so it looks reallyu smooth (I can't) you could just frost it with italian meringue alone, and it would hold perfectly, and you could decorate on top with buttercream (add softened butter to the meringue, or (again) white chocolate.


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## nsmoritz (Aug 11, 2008)

Wow! Thank you so much. Yes, she wants something light in texture and not too sweet. I have used gelatin to set the whipped cream before and it does okay for about an hour with the heat, but not much longer. That's why I was on the hunt for something better.

Normally the buttercream has been my choice for outside because it crusts and holds up. Even the cream cheese does well and I have used chocolate before to help it out and it is amazing how that makes such a difference. Even a chocolate cream cheese does amazingly well for a few hours because the chocolate and cream cheese when chilled solid beforehand really holds shape.

I will try the meringue to see how that works out. I read on it a little yesterday and it seems getting a clean smooth look is the difficult part. I think I do fine with the other frostings but they are durable. Any tips? I will do the crumb coat with the buttercream I suppose to hold it together and then try out the meringue. So, I can definitely frost the cake with the meringue and refrigerate the day before to have it ready?

It is a 4 tiered cake for 250 people. I will definitely drive a dowel through the top to secure it. It is such a simple cake with a ribbon at the base of each tier and then fresh flowers up one side so the smooth lines on the cake will be important.

I will test a few outside and let her see. I know she is up for suggestions she just preferred the whipped topping. I was worried about taking that chance though and was looking for other alternatives that I may not know about. I wondered what the pros use as an alternative to whipped cream and the meringue sounds great.

Thanks again!


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## robynlaurel (May 4, 2009)

Any chance of finding out how this went? What recipe did you go with and how did it work? I bet i'm not the only person who would love to know-- thanks!!


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## ed buchanan (May 29, 2006)

At 80 and the Humidity, nothing will really hold up well. Maybe Royal Iceing, OR POSSIBLY fondant but whipped topping will not.


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## nsmoritz (Aug 11, 2008)

Hello,

Thank you for the reply. This post was actually from last year and the event already took place. I actaully used a nondairy whipped topping and mixed in a little extra fresh whipped cream to add a creamy sweetness. It held up great. It took a lot of experimenting.

I made a few tester cakes and topped each one with different frostings such as italian meringue, swiss meringue, whipped cream, non-dairy whipped topping, American buttercream and my own mixed creation. I set them outside at the time of day for a few hours and then tasted and tested for texture.

It was my first wedding and of course all my nightmares came true. I showed up and the table from the night before was missing, the table they found had 3 small wobbly legs, under a pepper tree that was shedding, you name it and it happened. I pulled it all together grabbed an umbrella that was extra by the bar, grabbed some granite pave stones to even out the legs, stacked the cake and added last minute decorations right on time and hoped for the best!

That was a learning experience. I have done several more and wow do I have a detailed checklist with the bride beforehand!

Thank you again for your ideas and help!


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## goocakes123 (Sep 16, 2010)

i would try to add some white choclate pudding to the  whipped cream it stays a lot longer


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## boar_d_laze (Feb 13, 2008)

Would your friend go for leaving the cake unfrosted, decorated with flowers for the pictures and display, then served with cold chantilly, whipped at the last possible moment and held on ice until service?  

There are limits to how far you can push nature.  Under the circumstances it's unlikely she can get the frosting she wants with the texture she wants which will also hold up through an outdoor meal. 

She can't have everything, not even on her wedding day.  Something's got to give. 

BDL


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