Strawberry Buttercream with Freeze Dried Strawberries

When I think of strawberries I think of sunshine and happiness. Well, this strawberry buttercream with freeze dried strawberries will have you beaming just like the sun.

Not only that, but you will become everyone’s favorite person at summer parties and potlucks. Top this strawberry buttercream on cookies (my favorite, of course), cupcakes, brownies, and cakes. It also makes an out-of-this-world dip for pretzels. You have to try it.

Using freeze dried strawberries is key to this strawberry buttercream recipe. Strawberry buttercream with freeze dried strawberries will create the perfect consistency needed for stable buttercream.

This strawberry buttercream is also a crusting buttercream and an American buttercream. This means that the frosting is perfect for piping and decorating.

Follow along for the strawberry buttercream recipe that everyone will be begging you for the recipe. You are welcome to share it, of course. If you want to pretend it’s a long lost family recipe, I suppose I won’t mind either.

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How to Make Strawberry Buttercream With Freeze Dried Strawberries

Preparing the Freeze Dried Strawberries

You can go about this strawberry buttercream with freeze dried strawberries a couple of ways:

1. Use freeze dried whole or sliced strawberries, either store bought or homemade OR
2. Use powdered freeze dried strawberries

Using already powdered freeze dried strawberries will save you a step, but the powdered form tends to be more difficult to find in stores.

If you freeze dry your own strawberries or want to buy freeze dried strawberries, you will need to grind them up first.

To grind the strawberries up into a powder, use a food processor. Simply process the strawberries until they are a fine powder. The finer, the better. If you don’t mind larger bits of strawberry in your frosting, then it doesn’t have to be super fine.

This strawberry buttercream isn’t the best for piping details so it doesn’t need to be completely pulverized. There will still be seeds and bits of strawberry in the final product.

You will use a third of a cup of freeze dried strawberry powder in the buttercream. I found that purchasing a two ounce bag of freeze dried strawberries was a good amount. You will have a bit leftover which tastes amazing stirred into some vanilla ice cream or yogurt.

Making the Strawberry Buttercream Frosting

Before preparing the ground up freeze dried strawberries, take two sticks of salted butter out of the refrigerator and allow them to come to room temperature. Two sticks of butter is equivalent to one cup, or 8 ounces.

While you wait for the butter to come to room temperature, make the powdered/ground up freeze dried strawberries.

If you have powdered freeze dried strawberries already, you can skip this step.

Once the butter has come to room temperature, add it to a stand mixer and beat it with the paddle attachment on medium speed.

Cream the butter until it is lighter in color and all of the lumps are gone.

Turn off the stand mixer and add in four cups of powdered confectioner’s sugar. Four cups is a lot, yes. However, I promise the flavors will all balance out.

We use four cups of powdered sugar in order for the frosting to form a slight crust. All that means is that the outer layer of frosting will dry to the touch. This helps keep fingers cleaned when picking up the cookies & cupcakes.

With the four cups of powdered sugar, add in a third of a cup of powdered freeze dried strawberries, at least one and a half teaspoons of vanilla extract, and two tablespoons of milk.

Cover the stand mixer with a clean towel or a paper towel and mix on low/stir. Once the frosting is coming together, remove the towel. If the frosting is thicker than a creamy peanut butter consistency, add more milk. Keep in mind, the freeze dried strawberries will create a thicker buttercream so you will add more milk than usual.

Do not turn the mixer higher than low. If needed, use a rubber spatula to stir the frosting. Overmixing buttercream can cause air bubbles. If you do overmix, here’s a post on how to fix it. I promise it’s not terribly hard to fix, but, as always, prevention is better.

Now for the best part – perform a taste test. Is the strawberry flavor strong enough for you? You can add up to a half cup of the powdered strawberry powder. I find a third of a cup to be perfect for my taste buds, but we are all different!

Next, is the frosting too sweet for you? I am used to American buttercream recipes because I use it to decorate buttercream sugar cookies. However, some people find an American buttercream to be too sweet. If you want to cut the sweetness a bit, add in some salt or up to a 1/4 of a teaspoon of lemon extract.

Lemon extract will more easily mix into the buttercream than lemon juice at this point in the buttercream making process. Just be careful not to add too much lemon, as you will then have a strawberry lemonade type of buttercream. Still good but maybe not what you wanted.

Store this strawberry buttercream with freeze dried strawberries in an air tight container on the counter for several hours, in the fridge for up to a week, or in the freezer for up to three months.

How to Pipe Strawberry Buttercream onto Cookies and Cupcakes

If you wish to pipe this strawberry buttercream onto cookies or cupcakes, use a large decorating tip such as the Wilton 1M.

You can see how this tip looks on my post that details frosting rosettes.

Add the prepared buttercream frosting into a piping bag, only about a cup of frosting at a time. If the piping bag is too full, the bag may burst, or worse, your hand will hate you for making this frosting. Store the leftover frosting in the mixing bowl with a piece of plastic wrap over it.

If you don’t want to worry about tips, simply cut the bottom of the icing bag off after you’ve added the frosting to it.

You can have fun with an angled flat spatula if you want to smooth the frosting. These come in different sizes depending on if you are decorating cookies & cupcakes or cakes.

Don’t forget that any leftover strawberry frosting makes for an amazing pretzel dip or frosted onto graham crackers.

Have fun and enjoy!

Strawberry Buttercream as a Sweet Dip for Pretzels

It is easy to convert this strawberry buttercream to a sweet dip for pretzels. All you need to do is simply add in more whole milk until you achieve your desired dipping consistency. You can add in up to a quarter of a cup additional milk to the original strawberry buttercream recipe.

This pretzel dip is great for those that might not want a slice of cake or a cupcake, but would be happy with just a small treat. Set a bowl of the dip out and let friends & family enjoy. They will definitely ask you for the recipe, so be prepared!

Frosting for Graham Crackers

To prepare this strawberry buttercream as a frosting for graham crackers, follow the recipe as directed. You will want the frosting to be on the thicker side so that it stays on the graham cracker.

Go for a peanut butter consistency or thicker and both children and adults will enjoy this fun treat. Mix it up and top the buttercream on chocolate graham crackers for a chocolate covered strawberry flavor. So good!

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