This is my family favorite BEST cream cheese frosting recipe! It goes great on Carrot Cake, Red Velvet Cake, and just about any other flavor cake or cupcake you can imagine. I’ve been making this cream cheese icing for years!
If I had things my way, every cake and every cupcake would be be buried beneath a mountain of cream cheese frosting.
Not buttercream — Never rarely buttercream — always and only cream cheese. For someone with such a rampant sweet tooth, it’s alarming the number of times I’ve turned down a slice of cake or a sky-high frosted cupcake because the buttercream just makes my teeth hurt (OK full disclosure I have a buttercream recipe coming up on the blog next month, and it’s delicious, but cream cheese frosting will always win over my heart, even over my favorite chocolate frosting).
While buttercream frostings are usually too sweet, cream cheese frosting I could eat with a spoon, and this recipe is every bit as versatile as buttercream — it’s sturdy, pipe-able, can be dyed, and, most importantly, it’s delicious.
Tips for Making Cream Cheese Icing:
- Make sure that you are using full-fat brick cream cheese, not low fat or spreadable cream cheese (which is usually sold in a tub rather than in brick form).
- I always like to use unsalted butter and add a dash of salt so that I have complete control over the flavor of the frosting. However, if you only have salted butter on hand then just omit the salt called for in the recipe.
- Make sure you allow your cream cheese and your butter to soften before making your frosting! Softening the butter and cream cheese ensure that your ingredients will combine well and be lump free.
- If you intend to pipe your frosting, I recommend sifting your powdered sugar before mixing it into your butter/cream cheese mixture, as small lumps of sugar can clog up your piping tips, especially if you’re using a smaller tip.
Can cream cheese frosting be used for piping?
- Yes! Especially with this recipe because it is nice and thick. Now, this frosting (as with most) is prone to melting in hot weather, but it pipes nicely and as you can see in the photos it holds its shape neatly as well.
How do I make my cream cheese frosting thicker?
- What I love about this recipe is that it already makes a nice thick frosting, but if needed you can add more powdered sugar to make your cream cheese frosting even thicker. I recommend adding about 2 Tablespoons at a time until the desired thickness is reached. Alternatively you can add cornstarch… see more on that below.
Can I add cornstarch to my cream cheese frosting?
- Yup! While this recipe does not call for it, if you need a particularly stiff frosting or are looking to make your frosting thicker without making it sweeter, you can add cornstarch (in fact, I use this technique for my carrot cake cookies). I don’t recommend adding more than a few Tablespoons, so start with just one Tablespoon at a time until desired thickness is reached.
Alright, while (in my humble opinion) cream cheese frosting goes great with everything, there are certain cakes and cupcakes that complement it particularly well. Wednesday I’ll be sharing one of my favorite cupcakes with you — the exact cupcakes seen in the photos above.
Can you guess what flavor they are???
How to Make Cream Cheese Frosting
Cream Cheese Frosting
Ingredients
- ½ cup (1 stick) unsalted butter softened (113g)
- 8 oz cream cheese softened (brick-style, not spreadable) (226g)
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- 4 cups powdered sugar* (500g)
Instructions
- Combine butter and cream cheese in the bowl of a stand mixer (or you may use an electric mixer) and beat until creamy, well-combined, and lump-free.
- Add vanilla extract and salt and stir well to combine.
- With mixer on low, gradually add powdered sugar until completely combined.
- Use to frost completely cooled cake or cupcakes.
Notes
Nutrition
Nutritional information is based on third-party calculations and should be considered an estimate only. Actual nutritional content will vary based upon brands used, measuring methods, cooking method, portion sizes, and more.
Lynn
This is by far the best frosting I’ve ever made/had! 10/10
Cris
Hi – Can you freeze the cream cheese frosting?
Sam
Hi Cris! That should work just fine. 🙂
Ashla
By the way, this is delicious just as a strawberry dip.
Bree
Super easy to make and tastes great (used less sugar)! I saw several reviews recommending less sugar so I started with 200g instead of 500g (a little over a cup and a half instead of 4 cups) and totally agree- that is plenty sweet. I have a sweet tooth and can’t imagine how sweet it would be if you used the full amount. I’d start with less than half the sugar taste, then add more if you want. For anyone who wants to color it, I used gel food coloring after it was fully mixed and it worked great. I also saw a couple reviews saying the cream cheese taste wasn’t strong enough and the butter to cream cheese ratio was off but I disagree with that one. I looove cream cheese and cheese cream icing and think the cream cheese flavor is great, though maybe that is from using less sugar?
Luse Lieu
what can I use to color this icing?
Sam
I prefer gel food coloring. 🙂
Luse Lieu
Thank you 🙂
Also, what happens if I use 1/3 fat cream cheese? TIA
Sam
Your frosting won’t turn out quite right. It will be a bit runny. I wouldn’t recommend it.
Ginger Hackney
Perfect frosting!! I used two heart shaped pans & a red velvet cake recipe & had plenty of frosting. Taste great too!!!
Erin R Rankin
Hi Sam,
Do you think this is enough frosting for a 9″ x 13″ cake?
Thanks, Erin
Sam
Hi Erin! It will make enough frosting for a 9 x 13. 🙂
Erin R Rankin
Thank you.
Sandra
Amazing vanilla cake
Krisztina Nagy-Egri
Hi!
I’m thinking of baking your lemon blueberry cake with the cream cheese frosting for my sister’s birthday this weekend, but I have a big problem: we don’t have brick-style cream cheese in Hungary (Europe). What do you think I should replace it with? We have mascarpone, spreadable cream cheese (Philadelphia and the likes) etc. My sister would like the taste combo of blueberry + lemon + cheesecake.
Thank you for your help!
Krisztina
Sam
Hi Krisztina! Unfortunately, I don’t have a good substitute. The tubs of cream cheese typically have additives that make the frosting rather soft and kind of runny. 🙁
Suzy
Can I add frozen cherries?
Sam
Hi Suzy! I’m not sure how you would add frozen cherries to the frosting?
Naomi
Cream cheese frosting is the way to go!
I was out of cane sugar (I know crazy) but I did have powdered sugar so this was perfect. I must say, I only did one and a half cups of powdered sugar and it was definitely sweet enough. My kids liked it very much. I also used bourbon vanilla from Trader Joe’s and added lemon zest and one tablespoon of lemon juice (lemons from my tree are fragrant and sweet). The frosting came out perfect!
Thanks
Kris
Flavor was really great and not to sweet. It did not pipe well for me. I’m not sure if it’s because I sifted or it was slightly too warm. But even with chilling it wasn’t sturdy. I measured by weight. Not sure if it had anything to do with the food coloring I added (gel)?
Sam
Hi Kris! Did you use brick style cream cheese? If you did, it may have just needed a little bit more powdered sugar. 🙂
Gina Spencer
I used 3 cups of powered sugar and it was still sweet enough! It turned out perfect on carrot cake.
Danielle
Hi I will try this recipe this weekend. Can the icing be made ahead of time and frozen or refrigerated
Sam
Hi Danielle! The frosting will be good in the refrigerator for a week. You will want to wrap cover it tightly so it doensn’t dry out in the refrigerator. 🙂
Nicole
My hands are too warm. I must refrigerate my full icing bags before decorating. A great recipie.
Thank you.
Gerald Tramel
would this taste good on a banana cake?
Sam
Sure thing! 🙂
Connie
Sam I love the recipe and it turned out great on my cake. The icing did crust like my buttercream icing. Is that normal for this recipe? I didn’t refrigerate it the day I made the cake. Thank you for sharing the recipe! ❤️
Sam
Hi Connie! So glad you enjoyed! Yes the crusting is normal, it is designed to behave much like a buttercream frosting (only better tasting 😉).
Tess
Really delicious and consistency is perfect. The second time I used it, I added 1/4 teaspoon almond extract in addition to the vanilla (my grandmother always added almond). It too was delicious
Ashley
I just finished making the frosting. For me, the recipe needs more cream cheese — with just 8oz you barely get even a hint of the cream cheese. The whole point of cream cheese frosting is that cream cheese taste to balance the sweetness! So, I doubled it and, honestly, I could still add more! I won’t be piping it, so the doubling could make it less ideal for piping, not sure. It’s light and smooth and will be perfect for the cake.
Manon
On my end I used the metric measurement of butter (113 g) instead of imperial ½ cup of butter and the cream cheese tastes is fine. Maybe the is an error in the recipe but sur enough ½ cup of butter to 1 pack of cream cheese seams too much for me…
Paula
Hi there. How can I make this into a dark chocolate cream cheese frosting?
Sam
Hi Paula! I do have a chocolate cream cheese frosting that you could use dark chocolate in. 🙂
Erin
I agree! It needed more cream cheese! I like a really strong cream cheese flavor, and this tasted more like butter to me. This was the first time I had made it, so I didn’t want to change it too much, and I am taking it to a large family gathering where others might not like a strong cream cheese flavor.
But next time 2 blocks of cream cheese!