This swiss meringue buttercream is silky smooth and perfectly pipe-able. It is hands down the best sugar free frosting I’ve ever made and is worth the effort. Up your keto baking game with this amazing vanilla buttercream recipe. And it’s virtually carb free!
It’s January and you are all doing your best to get on track, stay on track, and avoid temptation. I totally respect that. I really do.
So why am I posting a recipe for something as decadent as Swiss Meringue Buttercream? Because, my friends, this is hands down the best sugar free frosting you will ever make, bar none. Silky, creamy, so easy to frost keto cakes and other goodies, and it holds its shape for days.
And even if it’s January and you are trying to be good, you deserve a sweet treat once in a while. Especially when it’s sugar free and keto-friendly!
I am a recent convert to Swiss Meringue, having made the American-style frosting all my life. While swiss meringue definitely requires a little more effort, both the flavor and consistency are worth it. It’s less tooth-achingly sweet but it’s silky smooth and the flavor is rich and buttery.
Heretofore, I despaired of making this gorgeous frosting because I knew that erythritol based sweeteners would re-crystallize too much. But having recently discovered that adding a little Bocha Sweet to my recipes helps keep them softer, I decided I wanted to tackle a sugar free Swiss Meringue recipe.
It. Was. Amazing. I felt like I had just won the keto dessert lottery. And conquering a sugar free frosting like this made me feel like I was ready for the big leagues.
What is Swiss Meringue Buttercream?
Swiss meringue is perhaps one of the most beloved frosting of professional bakers. It has an incomparable silky consistency and sweet buttery flavor, without being as tooth-achingly sweet as the standard American frosting.
It’s called “meringue” because it involves using egg whites to get a lighter, fluffier consistency. They are combined with sugar (or in our case, sweetener) and then gently warmed over a double boiler until the sweetener dissolves. Then they are whisked to stiff peaks.
You then add cubes of room temperature butter, which deflates the egg whites. For once, you actually want to deflate the egg whites so don’t panic! Once the whites and the butter are full combined, you truly have the most amazing silky frosting which pipes and spreads so well.
It also uses far less sugar or sweetener. A typical American buttercream will use upwards of 2 cups of powdered sugar, just to have the right structure. In many of my sugar free frosting recipes, I’ve gotten around this by using a little cream cheese to give it some structure without copious amounts of expensive sweeteners.
But this recipe for keto Swiss meringue buttercream uses less than a full cup of sweetener in the whole batch. And it’s enough to frost a 9 inch layer cake or about 18 cupcakes!
Sugar Free Frosting Research
Since Swiss meringue is a little trickier than your standard American buttercream, I knew I need to get the best tips and advice. I turned to some trusted dessert blogs and websites to learn just how to make it properly.
I found the instructions for Swiss Meringue from Handle the Heat to be clear and straightforward and so I followed those most closely.
I also read a great deal on what to do if it doesn’t come out right, which sometimes (often?) happens. My first batch curdled and I managed to rescue it based upon the tips provided on Serious Eats. The article was written by Stella Parks, of BraveTart and her advice was spot on.
Turns out that when it curdles, it may end up being fine if you keep whipping it. But if it won’t come back together, then it can mean that your butter was too cold. All you need to do is re-heat the whole mixture just a bit to bring up the temperature. Then you can keep whipping until it smoothes out.
Worked like a charm, thank you, Stella!
The second time I made it, I watched the temperature of my whites carefully, both while I was heating them and while I was cooling them. And I got perfect sugar free buttercream frosting from the start.
Advantages of Swiss Meringue Buttercream Frosting
Yes, it’s definitely trickier and more time consuming to make than standard buttercream. But it’s so so worth it.
I’ve already mentioned the incomparable taste and texture and the fact that it uses far less sweetener. But it holds up so well at room temperature and it doesn’t get overly greasy. It also doesn’t get crusty in the fridge and with the combination of Swerve and Bocha Sweet, it won’t recrystallize at all.
It can be made ahead and refrigerated for a day or two and can be frozen for up to 2 months. To make it smooth and creamy again, just let it come to room temperature and beat it on low until smooth.
Yes you can add other flavors and additions. I have yet to try that though but I will report back when I do!
So are you ready to up your keto baking game and give this amazing sugar free frosting a try?
Sugar Free Swiss Meringue Buttercream Frosting
Ingredients
- 4 large egg whites
- 1/2 cup powdered Swerve Sweetener
- 1/3 cup Bocha Sweet, (allulose or xylitol may also work)
- 1 cup unsalted butter, room temperature, cut into tablespoons
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 1/4 tsp salt
Instructions
- Make sure the bowl of a stand mixer is very clean and set over a pan of barely simmering water. Add egg whites and both sweeteners.
- Whisk gently but constantly, until the sweeteners have dissolved and egg whites are hot and slightly frothy. They should reach about 150F on an instant read thermometer.
- Transfer the bowl to the mixer and attach the whisk. Whip the egg whites at medium high speed until they are thick and glossy and the bottom of the bowl is no longer warm, anywhere between 5 and 10 minutes. The temperature should be about 90F on an instant read thermometer.
- Start adding the butter cubes one at a time until full incorporated and the frosting is smooth and creamy. Turn stand mixer to medium low and add the vanilla and salt until combined.
- Spread or pipe on your favorite keto cakes and cupcakes! This frosting also freezes really well. Let it come to room temperature again and rewhip lightly before frosting.
- NOTE: I know I will be answering this question over and over so let me just say it straight up. You need the two different sweeteners here! A combination of an erythritol based sweetener, such as Swerve, and one that keeps things softer, such as Bocha Sweet, xylitol, or possibly allulose, is necessary to achieve the correct consistency.
Notes
Nutrition
Nutritional Disclaimer
Please note that I am not a medical or nutritional professional. I am simply recounting and sharing my own experiences on this blog. Nothing I express here should be taken as medical advice and you should consult with your doctor before starting any diet or exercise program. I provide nutritional information for my recipes simply as a courtesy to my readers. It is calculated using MacGourmet software and I remove erythritol from the final carb count and net carb count, as it does not affect my own blood glucose levels. I do my best to be as accurate as possible but you should independently calculate nutritional information on your own before relying on them. I expressly disclaim any and all liability of any kind with respect to any act or omission wholly or in part in reliance on anything contained in this website.
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Thank you so much for this recipe! I’m an avid cupcake baker and I mainly use Swiss Meringue Buttercream. My brother-in-law requested Keto almond cupcakes for our Thanksgiving get-together. This recipe turned out absolutely PERFECT. Added amaretto and almond extract to mine. Thank you so, so much!
So glad to hear it and YUM on the amaretto!
Would powdered Bocha work better than the granulated?
Either works. It’s perfect the way it is, there is no “better”.
Wow, I’m hoping you see this that you may be able to help me out with my gorgeous yet too salty icing. My birthday is tomorrow (soon to be today – the 12th) and it’s my first birthday cake on keto. I made your icing and the consistency is like magic (I used allulose, by the way, and I whipped the butter for about 6 minutes before I started, so it’s really dreamy). Trouble is I didn’t realize that my butter was salted and so I added the salt. Now it’s too salty. I also had doubled the recipe so it’s a whole lot of icing that I don’t want to waste. Any ideas for how I can rescue it? I tried blending in a little more swerve (a couple tablespoons more) but it’s still too salty. I left out some more butter in case I need to start over in the morning, but I’m hoping that instead I’ll wake up and find – maybe from your response, if you see this by then – a good idea to save the giant bowl of icing I made tonight. Thank you for sharing this recipe, and for writing such fun pieces with each one of your recipes!
Oh no! I think what you’re going to need to do is make more and blend them together to reduce the salt factor. You will end up with a lot of frosting but the good news is that you can freeze it for future use.
You could also try just adding in something like chocolate to overpower the salt but then I worry that you’d end up with salty chocolate frosting. One final thought is to leave out all salt in your cake and offset the icing, even if you make more to blend them together.
Thanks so much for your input!
I ended up making a new frosting the next morning and the cake was delicious.
I also saved the giant amount of salty-sweet frosting I’d made the day before and with about half of it I tried adding chocolate, and the other half vanilla. Over the following week I used both flavors straight outta the fridge for adding to other baked goods that I made without salt. That worked perfectly and I used every drop (eventually).
Thanks again for helping me make (& save!) a phenomenal birthday treat!
So glad it worked out!
I wanted something besides a cream cheese frosting for my husband’s birthday cake and stumbled across this recipe yesterday. Let me just say that I am pretty much an amateur when it comes to something with this many steps and finicky processes and it came out PERFECTLY thanks to your instructions. I used a combination of powdered lakanto and allulose and it was silky smooth today, after being in the fridge overnight. This recipe is fantastic and I will absolutely make it again.
I am so delighted to hear that! It’s definitely a multistep recipe but it’s also rather forgiving since if it doesn’t turn out, there are ways to correct it.
I used this to fill my Neapolitan macarons for a diabetic BBQ. To die for!
Thank you
Nice!
I’d like to make this icing but the area that I’m in, I’m very limited for keto products. Would this icing work with liquid stevia?
No, I am sorry it won’t. It needs a bulk sweetener.
Absolutely fantastic! I could not tell that this was a sugar free frosting, nor could my hubby. Delicious perfection!
So glad to hear it!
I love your recipes. Thank you so much. But I would like to ask that you mention the ingredient for the sweeteners. Swerve andBocha are both brand names and don’t tell you what the actual ingredient is. I found when ordering online that often there are several sweeteners by swerve for example.
When I say “Swerve” it means granulated. When I say “powdered Swerve” it means powdered. Since Swerve is a specific formulation, I can’t call it by anything else. Also as far as I know, there is no other sweetener exactly like Bocha Sweet. So I have to call them by the brand name.
I love this recipe. I was about to experiment with sugar substitutes with a standard SMBC recipe, but I figured why reinvent the wheel and I googled 🙂 I actually felt it needed to be a bit sweeter, so I added some additional powdered sweetener at the end and it turned out fine.
Thanks so much for all your great recipes.
Could I use only Lakanto (monkfruit) powdered sweetener in place of both the Swerve and Bocha?
Yes… but it will recrystallize and that kind of defeats the purpose here.
Amaizing! Hands down the BEST low carb frosting I have ever had. Worked like a charm, no issues following your instructions. I didn’t have unsalted butter, so I used regular and left out the salt. I also didn’t have boca sweet, so I used a mixture of Erythritol and xylitol. Thank you!
Thanks for sharing the substitutions Heather!
Could I use Powdered swerve with Monkfruit sweetner?
If your monk fruit sweetener is mostly erythritol, then it will likely re-crysallize as it sits and cools.
I never post on these but I make a ton of your recipes. I just wanted to say this one really was a game changer!!! Now I need a cake recipe taken to the next level to match this perfect buttercream.
I made this today (1/4 batch) with the mini german chocolate cake recipe and it turned out excellent. I didn’t have to make any substitution for the powdered swerve as I had enough on hand. I love this recipe. Please post move variations and cakes. Thanks much.
Does the Swerve need to be powdered? In normal sMBC it is granular and dissolved into the egg whites.
should work with either, I would think. Because of the dissolving process.
Can you use all Bocha Sweet for this frosting?
My experience thus far with Bocha Sweet is that used full strength, it tends to make things TOO soft. So i haven’t tried in this buttercream but I would worry it would be goopy.
I made this and it turned out GREAT! I used Anthony’s brand erythritol (powdered in the food processor) and allulose. I also added about 1.5 tablespoons of espresso powder. The coffee flavor really masks any fake sugar taste. The meeting looked very dry compared to a regular meringue, so do not he alarmed if it seems weird.
After I started adding the butter it got super soupy- totally liquid. I though all was lost. BUT I cranked the mixer up to high (with paddle attachment) for a few minutes and eventually, amazingly, it came back together so silky and smooth! It took a little longer than a normal SMBC, so do not despair if it looks ruined. Just keep beating it!
That’s the crazy part about SMB, it can seem like a total disaster but it’s rescuable EVERY time.
Looks great! I have a quick question. I have been hoping for a frosting that I can put on a cake or cupcakes the day before a party and leave it out at room temp. Do you think this would be ok? I’m thinking like how you can leave store bought cupcakes out at room temp. I hate baking great cakes and then having to refrigerate them because of the frosting…it’s just not the same. Thanks! I can’t wait to try it!
As long as you don’t live in a really hot region or have your thermostat up too high, it should be fine for a day.