Ultra silky and totally delicious, this cream cheese keto buttercream frosting is bound to take your low carb cakes (and cupcakes!) to the next level.
Keto Buttercream Frosting
The Silkiest!
Full disclosure, I wasn’t a buttercream person. More like remove-the-frosting-from-the-cake sort of peeps!
That is until last week, when I discovered this frosting (a tip from a friend, tyvm). And no, I didn’t discover black thread, but I did take the time to choose the ingredients wisely and give real buttercream a try.
The ratios are fairly standard. With fairly equal amounts of butter and cream cheese going in. Sweetened to taste and, of course, a dash of great vanilla is a must.
The trick, it seems, is simply to procure the right ingredients. Check them out. Quite simple, but totally obvious when you think about it. Plus, this cream cheese variant is much less finicky than the all-butter and eggs version.
The Butter 🌾🐄
You are eating the butter raw, so going organic and grass-fed really is a must here. Because, aside from the taste being 1,34049 times better, grass-fed butter has a completely different nutritional profile to regular butter.
It is loaded with Vitamin-K2 (which de-calcifies your arteries), anti-inflammatory fatty acid called butyrate, among many other perks.
So if you have to choose just one product to splurge on, this is it!
The Cream Cheese
Again, procuring an organic or artisanal cream cheese is more ideal than your regular variety (i.e. Philadelphia). But not completely necessary taste wise.
During our trial runs we tried the buttercream with organic and Philadelphia (supermarket ran out of organic), and the difference was not as pronounced as with the butter. So take your pick.
The Sweetener
You can pretty much use whatever sweetener floats your boat. But it must be powdered. Xylitol (non-corn though to avoid tummy troubles!) and allulose are my top choice (no aftertaste!), and Lakanto (slight cooling, but barely any aftertaste!).
So get your blender out, make sure it’s completely dry, and process your sweetener of choice until powdered. Just make sure you wait a few moments for the dust to settle before opening the blender or food processor.
Or you can always grab a bag of Powdered Lakanto (just keep in mind its twice as sweet…. or even go for pure monkfruit extract (love Lakanto’s!) or stevia!
And if using xylitol, make sure to be careful if you have a pup around the house, as it’s highly toxic to the little guys! 🐕
The Vanilla
I’m a huge fan of Nielsen-Massey’s Madagascar vanilla for this frosting. And for pretty much every baked good, it’s seriously the best stuff.
Now all you need is the keto carrot cake!
(The Silkiest!) Keto Buttercream Frosting
Ingredients
- 140 g unsalted grass-fed butter at room temperature
- 140 g cream cheese at room temperature
- pinch kosher salt
- 1/4-1/2 cup powdered erythritol allulose or xylitol, to taste*
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- 2-3 tablespoons cocoa powder *for chocolate version
Instructions
- Add the butter and cream cheese to a large bowl. Beat the mixture with an electric mixer until evenly combined, about 2 minutes.
- Add the salt and sweetener, one tablespoon at a time, and continue to beat until pale and fluffy (8-10 minutes). Feel free to scrape the bowl as needed, and adjust sweetness to taste. Add vanilla extract and beat until fully incorporated.
- If making a chocolate version, sift the cocoa in one tablespoon at a time and beat until fully incorporated.
- One batch of frosting is enough for roughly 12 cupcakes.
Sooooo good. You are a genius. I made 3- 6 inch cakes even my non low carb friends loved them.
Wow! Great recipe. I did not have vanilla flavouring for the buttercream and used maple and caramel instead! The carrot cake muffins I doubled and everything came out so well. Thank you!
Wonderful to hear Reenie!!
Love EATING keto frosting!!!!! Thank you! I don’t really like the heaviness/thickness of traditional frosting, so I added about 1/4 c of organic heavy whipping cream to lighten it up a bit. Simply scrumptious!!
Did anyone ever figure out if it can be tinted? How is it for decorating, at least smoothing and a piped border?
Works just like buttercream Tammy! Xo
How much cocoa would you suggest using to make this chocolate icing
Can you use food dye to make frosting another color? I am diabetic and was going to make some tasty and low carb cupcakes for my daughters mermaid party.
Could I use food dye to make frosting another color ? I was gonna do healthy mermaid cupcakes for my daughters birthday that way I could have some too since I’m diabetic. 🙂
I love the flavor of this but I am having the same texture issue as others. I use 1 cup xylitol I powdered in my blender along with Organic Valley brand full fat cream cheese and the same brand butter (salted because it’s what I had). It seems like it curdles almost and gets so loose that it almost won’t stay on the cake. I can’t pinpoint whether this happens when I add the xylitol or add the vanilla extract. I am thinking that because Philly cream cheese usually has guar gum in it these days it may act as an emulsifier to keep it all together. I wonder if it needs some arrowroot or something like that in it to do the same thing when using organic brands? Welcome thoughts on this so I can make prettier cupcakes.
Try using Allulose. I used this and the frosting came out fine.
How many carbs are in the butter cream frosting?
Sierra, did you ever get a reply on the amount of carbs? I’ve been looking and can’t find anything that will give me a clue.
I don’t know why every time I add the powdered sweetener whether xylitol or erythritol, the whole frosting turns runny and even if I put it in the fridge it does not harden enough to be piped! Pls advise!
Can I use Mascarpone instead of cream cheese or maybe half of each?
Yup! Taste will change, but I love mascarpone!
Just made this with powdered erythritol and I don’t know what it was but the flavor was all off. 🙁 It tasted too strongly of butter and cream cheese (both were room temp); I added a third tsp of vanilla, then gradually added more tablespoons of erythritol while tasting, and finally added some cocoa (which I wasn’t planning on) trying to make it taste like frosting instead of overly sweet greasy cream cheese. I’m so confused because on paper it looks great and I see others have had success with the flavor (and the texture was on point for me). I also LOVE cream cheese frosting so I don’t know what the issue is. 😭
Question—the Cane version lists the carb and sugar counts, but the Keto version does not. Or am I looking in the wrong place? Can you provide that info?
I just made your carrot cake cupcakes and cream cheese frosting for my birthday. The cake part was good, but the frosting was so salty that it ruined the taste of the treat as a whole. Please suggest non-salted grass fed butter. It didn’t occur to me and I used what I had in the fridge. It could have been SOOOO good, I can tell it’s the best recipe. But please remind readers to use unsalted butter. I’ll be making it again for sure, the right way.
Mine didn’t work out sadly. It turned out grainy😕
If it turned out grainy it either means you didn’t use a powdered sweetener, or your butter/creamcheese were cold and they didn’t whip smooth 😉 xo!
I tried this with 4 Tbsp of powdered erythritol-stevia blend. The Philly cream cheese & butter were room temp and very soft and I whipped it with a standing mixer so no shortage of whipping time. It tastes great and spreads but it looks like there are little lumps in it but they are lumps! It’s like the frosting is clumpy and not smooth at all, it this makes any sense. Not sure what I could change to have nice smooth icing.. ?
Modify my comment. They look like lumps but are Not lumps….
Is one recipe enough for a three layer carrot cake? I want plenty of frosting for a special cake.
Is one recipe of the frosting enough for a three layer carrot cake? I want plenty of frostin for a special cake.
I wonder if you could use ghee instead of butter? My son is casein/whey sensitive.
What are the carbs for this?
I am also wondering what the carbs are for this – they are not listed in the nutrition table.
Hi! I love all of your recipes! I know this is silly but I just noticed that I can switch to US Cups for the amounts. However, when I am switched and hit print, it converts back to metric and only allows me to print metric. I don’t know if this is a glitch or if I’m doing something wrong. Appreciate your help! 🙂
Thanks for the heads up Sybil- I’ve added it to our ‘user-friendly requests’ for the site 😉 xo!!
What’s the serving size? Somehow I’m missing it
38 grams…2.5 table spoons whole recipe makes 12 servings according to nutrition label and recipe notes
How many fat bombs does this make and how do I measure each fat bomb? teaspoon? tablespoon? Not sure.. I made the mix but dont want to overeat it .. On Keto
It does not say whether u you use salted or unsalted butter. Can you please tell me before I make this and the fat bombs please?
Unsalted xo
mine turned out a bit “melted”. I let it harden in the fridge and tried to pipe but it turned liquid very quickly and I was not able to get nice stiff peaks. what should I do different, more powder stevia?, I followed the recipe exactly.
Hi Meagan! In all honesty I’m not sure why your frosting would come out runny… unless you added any liquids? Butter and cream cheese would go back to completely solid in the fridge, so it’s actually impossible chemistry wise if you used butter, cream cheese and powdered sweetener to get a runny frosting? I need more details to pinpoint what happened xo!
I am currently in the UK, and found that there are two different types of cream cheese- Philadelphia and the store brands. I made the mistake of buying the store brand and my recipe came out way too liquidy. It wouldn’t harden in the fridge, either. So now, I only use Philadelphia cream cheese in recipes where a major part of the texture is the cream cheese. I wonder if Megan’s problem had to do with the type of cream cheese she used? I haven’t tried this recipe yet (am about to embark), so I am not rating the recipe. But I will come back to leave a review! I’m adding the lemon zest because I am using it for the gingerbread cupcake recipe.
Ok- made it and here’s my review! It was simply delicious! I added the zest of one lemon and it was outstanding. I’ll use this recipe again as a base for all kinds of flavors!! Thanks!!
I have made buttercream frosting for nearly 50 years and my mother made it for longer than that. When I went Keto about 7 years ago I began making it with Stevia. It was good, but when I tried Pyure it was fantastic!!! I can eat it by the spoonful!!! And without a cake under it!!! LOL! Have been making cream cheese frosting all these years, too, but the discovery of Pyure was the trick for me!
LOL that’s so awesome Linda! I’m so happy you enjoyed it! ps. check out the buttercream fat bombs…! 😉 xo!
Indisputably the BEST cream cheese buttercream frosting. Keto or not
Hello,
My mother-in-law found your recipe and would like me to make it for her for her BIRTHDAY! She is a very KETO friendly person looking forward to your cupcakes VERY! I was looking at your recipe and several of your ingredients are in grams…. I have tried using the conversion charts, but have found that type of ingredients also makes a difference in the amount of grams…do you happen to have a recipe with the grams converted to cups or tablespoons/teaspoons? Or maybe a way to make it easier for me to convert?
Thanks so much,
Hi Natalie! Thank you for your message! You can go ahead and click on US Customary at the bottom of the ingredient list (in all recipes!) and it will give you a conversion to cups! 😉
xo! Paola
This frosting doesn’t taste keto at all… as in it ACTUALLY TASTES GOOD! Kuddos!
Thank you Anna! It’s most definitely one of our favorite things to have around 😉
Thanks for reporting back! xo!
Hi – Do you know the carb count for the keto version? I see you have the nutrition, but the carb count is missing. Thanks!
Hi Melissa! That’s because the carb count is roughy 0.25g/serving… so it registers as nil! xo!
this one’s truly AWESOME! i use swerve
I’m surprised this has no ratings already as I’ve seen several people say how good it is! I’ve made it three times already, a true gem!
Hahaha thank you Claire! Yes, we’ve had a few people in social media tell us how yummy it is! Glad you love it! ?
Quick question….Have you made a dairy free version? I can handle the butter but the cream cheese is a no go. Would you happen to have a substitute handy? I’m kinda new to this and husbands birthday is this month……sigh…
Hi Wendy! We have not tried a keto version without cream cheese. However, traditional buttercream is without cream cheese. Some variations have egg yolks, others are just just the butter (+ a touch of milk) with the powdered sugar and vanilla.
If you decide to go ahead and try do report back! And happy bday to your hubby! x
Hi Wendy, I use equal butter and coconut oil. It is delicious and I often eat it by the spoonfuls when craving something sweet.
I have made this a couple of times with Kite Hill fairy free cream cheese—it comes out AMAZING and you’d never know the difference 🙂