Cake Disasters

Mixer turning white frosting grey

When I try to make Swiss Meringue Butter Cream Icing my Kitchen Aid is turn the frosting grey every time. Anyone have any idea why this is happening. Sometimes this happens with my vanilla cake mix too.

7 Replies

It is most likely (In my experience) from washing the attachments in the dishwasher. You may try rubbing down your attachments with cooking oil then lemon juice. I always wash my attachments by hand now (beaters). HTH

Crystal Memories in the Baking

Check if there’s lubricant falling into the icing. Look up in the piece where the attachment goes.

Karin @ www.BlueSheepBakeShop.com

Your mixer might be leaking oil! Mine started doing that recently and my husband had to take it apart and regrease it! Check around the metal ring and see it there is any grease there! If so, google “how to clean my kitchen aid stand mixer” it will give you step by step direcitons on how to do it! Mine is like brand new and no more funny colors! Hope that helps!

This happened to me with my first artisan kitchenaid! It was loud and was leaking oil. I returned it after calling kitchenaid. The one I just got it happened at first but I cleaned with vinegar and it’s good now. If you wash your bowl and then dry it, it will not have any gray coming off. BUT if you take a small bit of shortening and rub it in the bowl with a paper towel, you will see it come off. Use vinegar to clean your bowl thoroughly then wash with hot soapy water and it should do the trick. I had to wash my new bowl 3 times with vinegar to get it all off, but it works. Hope this helps.

Tiff - MA www.facebook.com/sweetbeecakery

Thanks everyone for the feedback. I will try cleaning it differently. There is no oil leak. I can use a different bowl and paddle attachment and don’t have these issues.

It may be the paddle rubbing on the bottom of the bowl.

I have a KA with the anodized aluminum paddle. If it rubs on the bottom of the bowl while mixing I have that problem. It’s actually really gross. The aluminum being rubbed off into your food is the gray you see, YUCK! You can adjust the bowl height to keep the paddle from dragging on the bottom of the bowl. Another fix is to get a side-swipe beater or similar that is not made of aluminum. Here’s the one I use and I love it!
http://www.thatreallyfrostsme.com/2011/10/great-gadget-side-swipe.html

Frostine, http://thatreallyfrostsme.com

SongBird I think Crystal is right. I have the same issue, I’m going to replace my paddle, I think it’s from that one time I was so sick of cleaning up after decorating I put the paddle in the dishwasher. It was never the same, it leaves a grey color behind. I had a metal icecream scoop same thing, somethings are not meant for the dishwasher. They are never the same. Replace the paddle it might have issues hitting the bottom of the bowl, sometimes I feel like that might be my issue to but I know there is something up with that paddle. I recommend replacing the paddle first :)

Jessica, Kodiak Alaska http://www.facebook.com/ConceptualConfections