I’ve been testing several recipes for this icing and none gave the rich, caramel taste I was looking for. Then I made two major changes from most of the published recipes: I switched light brown sugar to dark brown sugar, and I browned the butter instead of simply just melting. The changes resulted in a deep caramel taste instead of vanilla flavor with hint of caramel.

The following recipe is adapted from Easy Caramel Frosting  from my 1963 copy of McCall’s Cookbook.

1/2 cup (one stick) butter
1 cup dark brown sugar
1/3 cup heavy cream
2 1/2 cups confectioners’ sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon finely ground sea salt
1/2 teaspoon fresh lemon juice

Melt butter in saucepan and continue over heat until the butter is brown, but not black. There’s good step-by-step instructions at All Recipes on how to brown butter.

Remove pan from heat and add lemon juice and brown sugar–stir until smooth.

Return pan to a med-low heat and bring to boil while constantly stirring. Boil mixture for one minute and remove from heat. Then add cream, stir until cream is incorporated.

Return pan to heat and stir until just boiling. Then remove from heat, add salt and let mixture cool to room temperature. When you taste the mixture at this point is may taste very strong and a bit too salty–that’s what you want.

Transfer caramel mixture to mixing bowl and slowly beat in sugar and vanilla until smooth.