Frosting that tastes less like cream cheese

Question

I want to make a rainbow birthday cake. The recipie I'm following uses a cream cheese based frosting:

• 600 g cream cheese
• 250 g soft butter
• 120 g powdered sugar

(The recipie is here, it is in German but all these rainbow cake recipies are very similar.)

Unfortunately last time the kids complained it was a bit too sour or tart. They might also psychologically object to the "cheese" in the cake. What can I do to reduce the acidity or cream cheese flavor of the frosting? I don't want to go with pure buttercream, it's too heavy and while the kids would enjoy it the adults will likely object.

Can I maybe replace some of the cream cheese with mascarpone? Or will that make the creme too soft?

Answer 1

Buttercream isn't heavy compared to cream cheese frosting, if it's whipped well it's actually lighter, so my first recommendation would be to work on your buttercream technique. Sifting the powdered sugar in and whipping the heck out of it is the way to go.

If you want a less cheesy cream cheese frosting then simply replace some of the cheese with butter to get a better balance. You could also increase the sugar content, it's really low for a frosting, especially a child-pleasing one. I'd double the sugar to start and switch 200g of cream cheese into butter and see how it comes out.