Royal Icing

This recipe is great! I dries hard like it should. But i actually added another cup of powdered sugar to get the consistency i wanted. (as is it comes out runny) I also added a tsp of vanilla instead of the lemon, and it still came out good. I will definately use this recipe again and often!

I used this icing to put together a gingerbread house (made with real, heavy gingerbread) and it worked wonderfully! It hardens quickly so your house will stay together, but you need to keep it in an icing bag or covered so it doesn't dry out in the bowl. Oh, I also left out the extract, which doesn't change the icing at all except for the taste.

I used this icing on rolled sugar cookies with great results. Yes, it was a little runny, but rather than adding more powdered sugar, I just used my pastry bag with a small round tip to pipe the icing over the top of each cookie, creating a beautifully finished look when dry. The icing took a few hours to dry completely, but was indestructable after that. Stored/froze well and tastes yummy; the lemon adds a nice flavor!

This is a good recipe. If it's coming out runny it's because you're not beating it enough. I let my mixer go for 5 minutes and beyond until I get peaks. It's shiny and tastes good too. By the way, did you know you can actually freeze royal icing? Just thaw and beat again and it works great.

This was a great icing recipe...I was looking for a keeper to use with my sugar cookies (The Best Rolled Sugar Cookies from this site by the way are the BEST...) This recipe worked GREAT with the pasteurized egg whites that come in a carton from the egg section, I was making cookies for my daughters pre-school class so regular raw egg whites were out of the question. I did add a 5th cup of powdered sugar as I wanted a stiffer icing. Worked and dried beautifully...thanks!

As others have mentioned, it's a bit runny. If you're using it as gingerbread house glue, don't put it on too thickly, or else it takes very long to dry (just like real glue)! I'm thinking that it would be best to use this icing mostly as glue and then maybe a fluffier icing for decorative iced accents. As far as decorating gingerbread cookies, though, it worked quite nicely! You can dip them in it (like someone mentioned for biscotti) or decorate them with it, or both. I posted a photo of my cookies and the initial stages of our very-sloppy gingerbread houses in my Cook's Photos.

This is a great recipe. I used 1/2 cup pasteurized egg whites from a carton. If your icing is too thin, it's not because you do not have enough powdered sugar, it's because you need to beat this type of icing for A LONG TIME. I beat mine for about 5-7 minutes on high to get to a "flooding" consistency and about 8-10 minutes for "outlining" consistency for decorating cookies. Just keep beating...it will thicken up. This is a meringue icing...JUST BEAT IT!! ;)

Recipe is quite misleading - I ended up using over a pound of confectioner's sugar to make it stiff enough to pipe onto gingerbread people to adhere decors on. Maybe if I were to ever use this recipe again, I'd use just one egg white and take it from there. I had a LOT of waste after adding all that sugar to stiffen it up.

I was just shy of 4 cups of icing sugar, but I had already cracked the 4 eggs needed to make a whole batch. I didn't want to waste them, so I added them all anyways. At first the icing was really runny, but it started to harden fairly quickly after I applied it to my gingerbread cookies (Eileen's Spicy Gingerbread cookies from this site). Even using your standard ziplock sandwich bag to apply the icing it went on smoothly. I was quite impressed with this recipe overall! I used rum extract (artificial) instead of lemon, but I think next time I may try the lemon or maybe almond or vanilla. Two thumbs up!

This was my first time using Royal Icing. I found this icing very easy to use for spreading as well as piping. Used vanilla extract and it tasted great. Took several hours to dry completely so they could be packed away. Used to decorate pumpkin cut-out sugar cookies that were then mailed to my husband Saudi Arabia. Cookies held up very well in shipping. Definitely recommend.

This was an easy recipe, and I added a little of my own almond flavoring rather than the lemon and it was awesome!

Add about 1/4 tsp of cream of tartar if you're looking to use this icing as a glue. It will hold much better.

This icing is really simple and good. When I made it, it was a little runnier than I had expected, but the taste was still fantastic.

This worked great, didn't take too long to make, spread very easily, added some food coloring and it make the perfect little xmas gingerbread cookies! Lemon complimented the ginger. Good recipe.

I think the mixed results for this recipe are due largely to to undefined size of egg. There is a big difference between small and jumbo size eggs and all the sizes in between. This recipe probably works very well with small eggs, but if you are using larger eggs you should take the increased volume of egg into consideration and either reduce the egg count to 2-3 or plan on increasing the sugar content.

This recipe is to close to regular icing. It didn't hold up my Gingerbread house. If you are making a gingergread house, your icing recipe should call for cream of tarter. It is the key to turning your icing into cement quickly. Learned this the hard way, hope it helps!

Great glue and icing for our gingerbread house!! I read other reviewers thoughts and used 3 large egg whites and 4 cups of confectioners sugar, 1 tsp vanilla and a dash or two of cream of tartar. PERFECTION. And the first time too!! (to pasteurize egg whites- slowly stir the egg whites with a whisk over a double boiler until they are warm to the touch but not too long!!)

This recipe was awesome!! I haven't worked with Royal Icing in years, and the last time I used it was after someone else made it. I whipped the dickens out of the egg whites and they were nice and airy when I added the confectioners' sugar. I was concerned at first because the batch was really really thick. But after I piped a few cookies, I watched out the batch did the glazing affect and it was pretty cool to see that it smoothed out as it harden. I think the lemon was a nice touch, but am thinking of using this again with a different flavor or extract. And going to attempt using a sugar alternative the next go around to see if I can make this sugar free. Thanks so much. This is a keeper for me and my future cookies.

The first time I made royal icing, it was definitely very runny, but here is the secret!!! The longer you beat your egg whites, the thicker it will be. The solution is not to add more icing sugar! Eggs whites will eventually turn into a thick foam, like shaving cream. You don't want your egg whites that thick, but just keep beating them! Trust me!

This is great! We used 3 egg whites, 4 cups confectioner's sugar and 1 tsp vanilla. We piped it to decorate gingerbread men and sugar cookies. Will DEFINATELY be using this again and again!

This is a good recipe. I do cake decorating and it's a variation of those which use merengue powder (in place of the egg white in this one). Because I had a can of powdered egg yolk in my cupboard, I used that in place of the fresh egg white in this recipe. I figured I may as well try. (water is added to the powder to create the white) I made half a recipe of the frosting and it was plenty for my 4 doz. gingerbread men. Just a tip; make sure to cover the bowl when not using the frosting and also use a moist cloth to put the tip of your bag in when not frosting the men - the frosting will start to harden and it will be difficult to use.

We used the frosting for cut out sugar cookies. I found the easiest way to use this is to put the icing in a ziplock bag and cut a very small part of the corner off. It is much easier (and less sticky) to spread the frosting around. This way, the sprinkles are the only really messy part of decorating!

This recipe served me well as I had no meringue powder to work with. I found it took a really long time to dry, though. I used it to frost the melted snowman cookies which it was perfect for, but I couldn't see using it for anything like a gingerbread house.

Easy recipe to use for decorating! I opted for vanilla flavoring instead of lemon, and also made some with mint extract. Next time I need to get a peppermint extract instead of the mint extract (A mixture) though because it tasted like toothpaste!!

So easy! So delicious! So easy to work with. Definitely a keeper1

AACCKK! Not sure what we did wrong but this came out SUPER runny and was incredibly hard to work with. We were hoping it would be a thicker toothpaste-type of consistency to use in assembling our gingerbread houses, but it was so thin and runny. What a mess!

The rating for this recipe was so good I didn't even bother reading the reviews--and I was super disappointed. I followed the recipe exactly and it's just as runny as the reviews say; and was pretty useless for making a gingerbread house (which is what I was making). I tried several times to construct my house with it, but the icing slid right down the sides and didn't even come close to filling in the natural nooks and crannies of the gingerbread--maybe some better bakers than me know how to make gingerbread houses with perfectly straight-edged pieces that would hold together with this icing. And you definitely can't do any decorating with it. I suggest using Royal Icing III by Veronica. It was the perfect thickness to be manageable while still setting fairly quickly.

Perfect icing for my gingerbread men. Like other reviewers said, it made a TON of icing. I decorated probably 50 gingerbread men and didn't even put a dent in the icing. Easily 1/3 it or 1/4 it. I also used a pasturized egg white product from the refrigerator section near the eggs, so I wouldn't worry about the kids. It worked quite well. It may have been more runny because of this - next time I will make it thicker. Hardened up perfectly though!

First time making these and it turned out wonderful! Thanks!

Perfect for gingerbread houses.

Good, but required an extra cup of confectioner's sugar to get to piping consistency.

Worked great! Added some vanilla powdered extract for a more intense flavor.

Was great for decorating "The Best Rolled Sugar Cookies" by Jill Saunders :D.......

You could build a sky scraper with this stuff. Didn't have lemon, but added 1/2 tsp. vanilla X and it was great.

I had to alter this a little bit to make it thick enough. I used 2 egg whites, whipped really well, then added 3+ cups of powdered sugar.

Super easy to make and easy to scale. Thanks for sharing! This made my gingerbread men MUCH more exciting!

My eggs must be grade F lol because my icing turned out very runny. It was fine though since I didn't use it for gingerbread houses. We used it to decorate gingerbread cookies.

First time followed amounts and had to add a lot more powdered sugar. Second time halfed the egg whites and simply kept adding sugar till I got the thickness I wanted. Love how fast it hardens.

Great recipe! I used powdered egg whites which worked well. I had to add some powdered sugar to thicken it for piping and finishing my gingerbread house but used it "as is" to spread on sugar cookies which my kids added sprinkles to. Will def use this again!

Great recipe. Makes way too much if you are decorating Gingerbread Men. Use the smallest decorator tip you can find because the icing is runny. (We used a 3, next time I will try a 1 for the small sized cookies.) The icing dried nicely and we loved the addition of the lemon extract. This will be our standard icing from now on!!

Excellent frosting: spreads nice, dries fast, won't crack or melt. You can make interesting variations by adding food coloring and/or different extracts like vanilla or almond. Thank you!!! :)

This is absolutely perfect and so easy to make. I substituted pure orange extract instead of lemon and it was SO good. I will definitely use this recipe again.

Wonderful icing recipe; simple to make and looks wonderful once it dries! I've always looked for a recipe like this, and now I've found it. Thank you!!!

I thought 4 egg whites was too much -- I used 2 egg whites and came out great. It was perfect for our gingerbread house and held the pieces up well. Doesn't taste good though - good for something like a gingerbread house where you just need it to be more strong than tasty.

This is a nice icing for cookies. I tried to make it for assembling a gingerbread house but even with adding cream of tartar to hopefully thicken it it was still to runny. I will keep this recipe for cookies.

This turned out great. I was in a really big hurry so I didn't measure anything. Just threw the three ingredients in and mixed it up until it was a smooth consistency. I thought I had made the icing too thick but it turned out perfectly. We constructed 4 gingerbread houses with about 3 cups of icing. The icing took about 5-10 minutes to set up and hold pieces of the house together.

What could be better than an icing recipe that is so simple, tastes well (for royal icing anyway) and easy to work with!? This will be my go to recipe whenever Royal Icing is in the picture!

This icing was exactly what was needed to decorate our soft gingerbread men and also for decorated sugar cookies! I don't care much for lemon so I added 1/2 tsp vanilla and 1 tsp almond extract to the icing for a nice flavor. The kids used spoons to pour icing on the cookies, then the decorations. It did harden nicely and the cookies ended up looking almost too good to eat! Thanks for the recipe Diane!

Wonderful! This icing was nice and thick and perfect for our gingerbread men! It was so thick I had to spoon it on and spread it with a paintbrush. It dried quickly too! It was drying as I used it and I think it was completely dry in about 5 hours or so. It was PERFECT for making tye-dye effects too!

I used this for Halloween and Christmas and now for Valentines day! Its perfect! I do use powdered egg whites in place of fresh.

After using up the store brand icing that came with the gingerbread house, I needed to make a quick icing to finish up the house so I chose this recipe but replaced the lemon extract for vanilla and it was fantastic!!! The consistency was perfect, I did add just a little bit more of the conf. sugar but it was great to work with, not runny at all, just thick enough to spread!! Thanks for the save!!!

This was my first time making royal icing. I followed the recipe exactly, but substituted the lemon juice with vanilla instead. The result was a very runny consistency so I ended up having to have more confectioner's sugar until I got a workable consistency. I used the icing to pipe my sugar cookies for a birthday party. In the end, my cookies came out beautifully and everyone enjoyed them. However, I would definitely suggest adding more confectioner's sugar to thicken up the icing.

We are making gingerbread houses, and this has made for perfect glue and was hard as a rock as it dried. Thanks!

Worked out perfectly! Really yummy but not too sweet and hardenend up wonderfully. Used it to make rice crispy dinosaur easter eggs! Pictures posted :)

This is a great recipe!!!! I made it two different ways: the original--and I'll be sticking to that. But I also made anise cookies and wanted to frost them, so instead of using lemon extract, I substituted black liquorice liquor. It came out great!!! Thanks for the post!!!

This is a great royal icing. It made excellent decorations for my gingerbread men. We used other types of extracts to give our icings different flavors (like vanilla and almond) and added more sugar to make the icing stiffer so it didn't run when we put it on the cookies. Definitely add more sugar if you're putting it on gingerbread houses!

So easy and so perfect! It dried quick enough and stayed hard, unlike other cookie icing recipes I've tried. I was only planning on doing some piping on the cookies so I reduced the recipe by half. I used vanilla extract since I didn't have the lemon, and used 2 egg whites and 2 1/2 C of the powdered sugar, as per one of the reviews.

this icing was not shiny at all. The taste also was not good.

I realised that I left my meringue powder at my parents' home and was at such a loss, until I found this recipe that is :) I used vanilla instead of lemon for my Valentines Day sugar cookies, worked great!

For gluing together gingerbread houses I had to use a total of 6 C of confectioners sugar, and I probably should have used 7. I can see how this would be good for making a hard glaze on sugar cookies, but it didn't work for us as a glue.

This ended up being the perfect consistancy for "dipping" cookies to adhere sprinkles or sparkling sugars, but if you wanted to pipe this it would need a considerable amount more powdered sugar. It was waaaay too thin for a piping bag. It doesn't specify what to do with this icing after making, but I always believed true royal icing to be a much, much thicker consistancy.

I used this icing to make graham cracker houses. Worked perfect!

Good recipe. It hardened up just like it should!

Great for icing all those cut-out cookies. I love that it dries nice and hard and is also easy to work with.

WAY too runny -it came out of my icing bag like water. Be prepared to either add one less egg white or a lot more sugar. I used this recipe to make snowflakes for a cake and after adding a lot more sugar to the icing, the snowflakes turned out fairly well. I would use this recipe again, although with more sugar.

This was perfect for my gingerbread cookies- however I did use vanilla instead of lemon. It had good consistency, was very easy to work with, dried quickly and held firm. This one is a keeper!

For this recipe I added 1/4 tsp baking powder and mixed again at high speed. If it dries out too much just add a Tlb of milk.

A great icing to use. We used it for gingerbread houses and it made them very sturdy!

This icing was good and the perfect consistency for my melted snowman cookies. :) Such fun!...

My 11-year old prepared this and it came out excellent. We used food coloring to make differenct colors and then iced our "Busia's Cutout Cookies" from this site. When preparing, the icing will have a distinct lemony flavor. However, when the icing hardens much of this goes away. That is good, because the lemony flavor was just a bit too much for my 8- year old son.

Perfect...I used it to ice my sugar and gingerbread cokies, but used vanilla instead of lemon flavor. Might try almond in the future...outstanding recipe.

This icing was perfect for our gingerbread house, it held really well and was easy for the kids to decorate with.

This was awesome! Made pretty, lasting decorations for a wedding cake. Best of all, I liked how it didn't call for meringue powder, which is expensive! Thank you!

I really like this recipe. It worked great on small butter cookies.

Excellent! It is SO hard when dry! I just found that it was kind of hard to use after about 15 minutes, but I think thats because of my supplies, and now the icing itself!

This recipe turned out great! A tip I learned from cake school, never use plastic while making royal icing as it breaks the icing down. Also just beat at high speed. It will stiffen in about five minutes!

This was my first time making Royal Icing. I made lingerie shower bra/panty cookies and the icing worked very well. I painted the cookies with a silicon pastry brush and the icing smoothed out without a problem (no brush marks). I piped dots around each cookie without any issues. The icing was a little runny at first but once you let it sit it'll thicken. Also I kept a damp cloth over my icing bowl when I was not using it to keep it from hardening.

This recipe was super easy. I used almond extract instead of the alcohol and used the frosting to decorate individual brownie bites with a ganache frosting I made (also from this site). I'll definitely use this again!

Finally found the recipe I have been looking for! I knew it had egg whites but wasn't sure what else and yet its so so so easy. For my tastes I used vanilla extract, but I loved the consistancy, how easy it was, and the flavor. This is the one for me forever!

Worked so well on our gingerbread men. This is a keeper, I will use over and over on many types of rolled cookies.

I used this icing for cupcakes it was better than frosting them this one is a keeper for sure. I was a bit thick when I made it so I add a little water and it turned out just fine not to thick not to runing 5 *s. Thanks

I LOVE this recipe! It's so easy. I used it for a cake and will continue to use it. It's also great to use for cookie decorating.

perfect!

Worked like a charm. The addition of the lemon extract adds some flavor that other royal icings lack. Now, if I could just get some patience and decorating skills.......

Used this for icing sugar cookies and it worked beautifully. I used vanilla extract, as that is what I had on hand, and it was delicious. This will be my go-to sugar cookie icing.

Excellent! I made no changes. Will definitely make this again.

First time making royal icing. I used these on some sugar cookies and they made the sugar cookies taste AWESOME!!! Love this recipe. A but runny, but still manageable!

Great tasting recipe but was very runny. I will try it again with more sugar to see if its easier to work with it.

Easy to make this perfect icing! Makes a lot.

Love this icing.

I cannot get over the consistancy of this icing! I was like marshmallow! And the shine was perfect! I'm using it to glue my gingerbread houses together so I added an extra cup of sugar. Great recipe! Thanks for sharing!

Simple and easy to make.

I used this as a base and made some modifications. I had 3 egg whites left over from another recipe so I planned to use 3 cups of confectioner's sugar (1:1 ration for you math people). However, I found it a bit runny so I added another 0.5 cup to get to the consistency I wanted -- plus, I didn't want to wait forever for the icing to dry.

I didn't have any trouble with this recipe. I followed the recipe, except I used vanilla extract instead of lemon. It worked fine, and I didn't have any problems with runny icing. Maybe it's because I beat the egg whites for a long time? Well, great recipe. Tasted great, too.

super easy to make and work with!! Great recipe!!

This was my first time making royal icing. It was very easy to make and taste great.

I am an utter cookie decorating novice and had a few technical problems decorating my gingerbread stars (filled my piping bag WAY too full, had Royal icing up to my ELBOW!) and husband wanted to know how much I'd had to drink before I decorated them but the icing is easy to make and made even my wiggly splodges look pretty good!

A bit runny but still easy to work with. Taste isn't so great but I guess it's just royal icing that I don't like...

This is a great icing that I use religiously on The Best Rolled Sugar Cookies recipe from this site. Thanks Diane!