Supermarket Cake Frosting Mixes and Tubs ?

[rotuts]

I hope I found the right Forum

 

pls excuse that this is a very Low End

 

point of information. :

 

here I posted about a chocolate cake w frosting from TJ's :

 

https://forums.egullet.org/topic/155097-trader-joes-products-2017–/?page=16&tab=comments#comment-2188387

 

 

my question

 

pls excuse

 

is about commercial frostings and tubs

 

Im assuming that the versions I had a long time ago

 

had powdered sugar as their base

 

then  Tubs were introduced 

 

with seriously saturated fats

 

was this an comic move ?

 

based on sugar prices ?

 

or close to free palm  oil that could then be super saturated ?

 

than ks

[ChocoMom]

I thought the introduction of tubbed frostings were for the sake of convenience, and less mess.  My parents were older than most others, and did things in a more old-fashioned way-so I was quite used to getting out the butter, powdered sugar, etc, or, seeing Mom use a boxed frosting mix.  

 

When us kids got older, and Mom got busier with her hobbies, she would still do obligatory baking for various school or church events. But, given her new, busier life, she was looking for shortcuts, and tubbed frosting was a dream come true for her.  I thought the stuff was a little off-tasting, and preferred the boxed mix frostings. (I later became accustomed to the really chocolatey tubbed icing.)   Soon, I was unable to find the boxed mixes on the shelf at the store. Once in a while, I'd see a Jiffy frosting mix, and now I can't even seem to find that.   Jiffy wasn't exactly top of the line, and was kind of grainy, so, I'd decline buying it.    

 

More expensive, but quite tasty, is the King Arthur chocolate buttercream frosting mix.  Today, I use half butter, half shortening, powdered sugar, 2 drops of almond extract, 2 drops of coconut extract (which erases that funny powdered sugar taste), HWC,  marshmallow fluff, and a little vanilla- or cocoa powder and espresso- depending on what is needed.    Yes, its messier than cracking open a tub of icing, but waaaaayyyy tastier.  

 

I'm not sure that it was the cost of sugar that made manufacturers turn to tubbed icing, but rather their knowing that consumers were living faster paced lives and would pay a little more for convenience of pre-made frosting.    

 

Incidentally, that tubbed chocolate frosting is wonderful smacked in between graham crackers. Mom would use up left over frosting like that, and put them in our lunches for a treat.  I use the leftover homemade frosting like that for my kids.  yum. 

[MelissaH]

24 minutes ago, ChocoMom said:

More expensive, but quite tasty, is the King Arthur chocolate buttercream frosting mix.  Today, I use half butter, half shortening, powdered sugar, 2 drops of almond extract, 2 drops of coconut extract (which erases that funny powdered sugar taste), HWC,  marshmallow fluff, and a little vanilla- or cocoa powder and espresso- depending on what is needed.

Have you tried using organic powdered sugar? It typically uses tapioca starch rather than cornstarch (because it's difficult to source non-GMO corn) and thus has a different mouthfeel. It also doesn't taste as processed, thus you might not need to add the coconut extract.