Has anyone ever done flour frosting with cream cheese?

[roxlet]

I'm making a carrot cake for my son's birthday today, and I find regular cream cheese frosting to be kind of uninteresting and thick. So I'm thinking of adding cream cheese along with the butter when I make a flour frosting. I don't see why this wouldn't work, and I'm wondering if anyone has ever tried this.

[KSlink]

Although I haven't even tried the flour frosting yet, just a few days ago it crossed my mind that it was something that might work well with cream cheese--et voila!!!

Looking forward to slathering it on my chocolate midnight cake if it ever cools off enough to turn the oven on again....

[roxlet]

Well, if anyone is interested, this worked out very well and is quite delicious. I used this recipe:

1/4 cup flour
1 cup sugar
1 cup milk (or coconut milk for coconut cake)
1 cup butter cut in cubes (My butter was cool and firm, but I could still leave an indent when I pressed my finger into it)
1 tsp vanilla
pinch of salt

1. In a medium heavy-bottomed saucepan, whisk the sugar, flour, salt together. Add the milk and cook over medium heat, whisking constantly until the mixture has thickened into a paste and slightly bubbly at edges.
2. Transfer the mixture to the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. Beat on high speed until cool. Reduce the speed to low and add the butter; beat until thoroughly incorporated. Increase the speed to medium-high and beat until the frosting is light and fluffy. If the frosting is too soft, transfer the bowl to the refrigerator to chill slightly: then beat again until it is the proper consistency.

3. Add the vanilla and continue mixing until combined.

For a two layer 9X12 cake, I doubled this recipe. I beat it until it cooled, and then added 16 ounces of cream cheese, and one stick of butter cut into bits. I think that it was a bit looser than I would have liked, but the taste is excellent -- much the best cream cheese frosting I've tasted. Next time I make it, I will increase the amount of flour to make a slightly stiffer paste before adding the cream cheese and butter. I wound up putting the frosting into the fridge, and then putting a crumb coat and chilling again. I have the fully frosted cake in the refrigerator now.

[ChristinaMason]

Nice! Thanks for reporting back. That sounds very good.

[jvanderh]

Sorry, what was the final amount of butter and cream cheese?

[TerriL]

So, did you make the recipe just once, doubling the above ingredients, and adding 16 ounces of cream cheese? Thx

[roxlet]

Sorry, that was not clear. I doubled the frosting recipe above, and used 16 oz of cream cheese and 8 oz of cream cheese. It was a very large cake. That was the final amount. As I said above, I would increase the flour a bit to make a stiffer paste, and I would definitely plan on refrigerating before spreading the icing. For a smaller cake, I would start with the frosting recipe above and use 8 oz of cream cheese and 4 oz of butter, and see what it looks like.

[magiesmom]

do you mean 16 of cc and 8 of butter?

[roxlet]

Gosh, I misspoke! Yes! 16 oz. cream cheese, and 8 oz butter for the double recipe.

[jvanderh]

Thanks for the clarification. You were using regular, granulated sugar, right?

[TerriL]

Thanks for updating. I looked at the ktchn.com recipe (linked above) to compare, and it uses only cream cheese. Was there a reason you used butter as well?

[todao]

This writer recommends it highly:
http://www.thekitchn.com/recipe-extra...

[roxlet]

Thanks for the link. That was interesting. I was going to try it with a combo of butter and cream cheese, so this was interesting to read. I have to think about what he best way would be to do it.