Blitz This No-Brainer, No-Powdered Sugar Chocolate Frosting

Snowed in? Need chocolate frosting now? All you need is a food processor or blender, chocolate chips, evaporated milk, butter, and a little salt. No sugar.

How to Make Better Powdered Sugar Frosting & Icing

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This is your new fail-safe, kid-friendly, crowd-pleasing cake frosting made from ingredients you’ll never not keep in your pantry again. Here’s a bonus: If you are tired of my telling you not to use chocolate chips in recipes that require melted chocolate, this is the recipe you’ve been waiting for! Chocolate chips work best here, so if you don’t feel like chopping chocolate, rejoice.

What You Need

One 12-ounce bag of chocolate chips—the kind that are shaped like little kisses —not chunks or disks. For dark chocolate (semisweet, dark, bittersweet, or extra dark), use 1 cup of evaporated milk; for milk chocolate, use 1/3 cup of evaporated milk. Both need 4 tablespoons of butter and 1/8 teaspoon of salt.

What You Do

Dump chocolate chips into a food processor (or blender). Heat evaporated milk to a simmer and pour it over the chocolate. Add butter in several pieces, and salt. Process, scraping the bowl once or twice, until the chocolate and butter are melted and the mixture cools and thickens, at least slightly (thickness at this stage depends on the chocolate—milk and extra-dark chocolate will be thicker right away). It will thicken as it rests. Scrape frosting into a bowl and let it sit at room temperature until it’s thickened to a perfect spreadable-but-soft, swirl-able consistency with a beautiful glossy sheen. It may take a while to come to the right consistency—as little as 15 minutes or as long as an hour; be patient and resist the urge to refrigerate it to hasten the process. It won’t be as pretty if it hardens before you spread it on.

Note: This simple recipe capitalizes on the composition and unique melting characteristics of chocolate chips—rather than bar chocolate or wafers—so really, stick with them this time.

What's your go-to frosting? Let us know in the comments!