Tips and Tricks for Stable Caramel frosting

Update (April 9 2015): After many times making this recipe, I noticed that letting the water boil until all sugar is melted allows more water to evaporate which in turn reduces the amount of liquid in your frosting. Also, make sure that the evaporated milk is just about to start to boil before you pour into your eggyolk mixture. Otherwise, you will cook your eggyolks fast like scrambled eggs. Lastly, I noticed that reducing the amount of butter helps its stability.

===================================

For those who follow the Caramel cake recipe from Corinne in her blog, the Heart of Mary, I'm sure some of you are having challenges in creating a polished look without melting similar to those caramel cakes being sold in the northern part of Manila.

After making my fair share of caramel cakes in the humid weather like Singapore, here are my tips to achieve a stable caramel frosting that can survive the trip outdoors from point A to point B. I have been successful transporting this cake without a cooler bag travelling within an hour in an airconditioned MRT. I have also witnessed this cake standing up on its own for 1-2 hours indoors at room temp. However, do not tempt fate and display this under the sun if you do not want to have a frumpy looking caramel cake.

1. Increase cornstarch amounts from 1.5 tbsp to 2 tbsp
2. Pour 3/4 or 4/5 of the mixture on a cold cake while it is still warm. The cake should be chilled at least 4 hours (as in super cold but not frozen). This helps set the caramel immediately. Tip the cake to let the cake flow on the sides but do not need to be perfect. I guarantee some of the frosting will overflow to your cakeboard and drip at the sides. Do not fret as you can still fix this later which I will explain later.
3. After the first frosting, chill in the fridge for at least 15-20 minutes. I take this time to do some clean-up or prep for my next bake.
4. Take out the cake and get yourself an offset spatula or bowl scraper then scrape the overflow on your cake board back to the sides of the cake. Then, contour the sides to even out bumps and gaps. Use the remaining frosting in the saucepan to add more frosting on the sides. At this point, do not touch the top of the cake if you want to keep a smooth finish. Bring it back to the fridge to cool for another 15-20 mins.
5. Take it out once again and do a final smoothing with the spatula. Then clean out leftover caramel on the cakeboard with moistened warm paper towel.
6. Return to the fridge and leave the cake and caramel frosting to set (and undisturbed) overnight.

Hope this helps. Let me know what you think or if you have other suggestions to tame this delectable caramel frosting.