Help with replicating grandmother's cake icing

[terrence chaplin]

Hey folks.
I am attempting to duplicate a cake from my grandmothers recipe book. the hard part is the icing o f the cake. the icing is just that , an icing not a frosting. she used a spatula to ice the cake and the icing was like melted chocolate that when it cooled it got stiff on the cake ,like a store bought packaged cupcake topping. the recipe seems skewed. my sister supplied it, but missing the how to part, all i have is the ingredients. seems impossible to make. with only 1 oz of chocolate , impossible to cram in an entire cup of confectioner sugar? unless you somehow wet the sugar first, the chocolate will not accept that much sugar. i already ruined one batch. forgot to warm the milk it is only 11/4 tsp . turned the chocolate to a ball of fudge! second one got the milk in there nice and the butter, but not the sugar? this recipe was our favorite on our birthday cakes as children but cannot do the icing ? any ideas out there? my grandmother was a baker for the airlines back in the 40's! If this is the same ingredient list,not sure how she was ale to ice a cake with this. it is a tube cake!

 

[Zyni]

If you have the actual name of the cake or the icing, you might be able to find another, similar recipe that will work.

As for me, butter cream icing has always been challenging for me. My daughter does it well, and showed me how, so maybe this will help you too. She softens the butter (just a little, do NOT melt it). She begins whipping the butter then slowly adds in the powdered sugar a little bit at a time, sometimes adding a drop of milk if needed. Just a drop. Then repeat.

While these directions sound simple enough, it makes a huge difference. If you pour everything in and try to mix, you just get a mess. Taking your time and mixing everything in slowly really helps. Good luck.

 

[connie]

Have you considered the fact that chocolate was different back then? You may need to experiment with different qualities of chocolate.

so you basically have

1oz chocolate
1 cup confectioner sugar
1 1/4 tsp milk.

nothing else?
So what chocolate, milk, dark, white?

Are you sure there is not a typo and it is not 10oz chocolate? It would make much more sense.