Glossy Royal Icing

Sorry, but this does not belong in the royal icing category. It is a GLAZE. A very good one...but an icing glaze. And yes it hardens and is shiny, but it is not a royal icing. It has a category of its own. Also it doesn't dry and harden as quickly. It's all I ever used to use....It tastes better than most royal icings and that is a plus. But for fine detail that holds it shape better...the royal icing wins. On taste...the glaze wins hands down.

I love that this recipe does not contain egg whites, so I feel better serving it to young kids. I used it to decorate my gingerbread men; I simply scooped the icing into a decorating bag with a plain tip. You can easily change the consistency by adding a little more warm water (thinner) or a little more powdered sugar (thicker). A little goes a long ways! Quick and easy.

So easy to prepare, and came out perfect...I just made this and the icing is already setting up and hardening nicely. i added orange extract to mine to go with chocolate angel cutouts...great recipe!

I used and really liked this recipe. I subbed 1/2 teaspoon of vanilla extract for the almond extract due to allergies and it turned out well

It worked perfectly for my chocolate sugar cookies! I added quite a bit more sugar to make it thicker & the color stand out more. I also used coconut extract (just cuz I love that stuff & it tastes great w/chocolate!) instead & it tastes great!! Good alternative when egg in icing kinda grosses you out & you don't have meringue powder! haha

After trying two batches of the glaze that was suggested for the sugar cookies I made and have them both bomb, I'm so glad I found this recipe and tried it. It was perfect! Easy to make, easy to dip my camel shaped cookies into and get the icing where I wanted, and are now beginning to harden just like I wanted!! Next time I'll try a different extract, but didn't want to deviate from the original recipe on my first go. I live in the middle east and we are having U.S. military personnel over for Thanksgiving, these camel cookies are to go in the 'to-go' treat bags when they leave.

I have been on the hunt for the perfect Royal Icing recipe and this is my winner!! It may not be a technical "royal" icing but it is the best I have ever used! All of the royal icing recipes I have tried either don't taste very good or they are hard- rock hard! Everyone said the cookies tasted as good as they looked! I had to add about 4 tbsp more water then this recipe called for but just add what you need!

Flawless recipe - thank you!!

Used rum extract, worked great!

Followed the recipe exactly, highly recommend! It dries to the touch rather quickly, so handling them is easier. Made valentine cookies with my 2 sons and they had a blast. This will be my go-to sugar cookie icing recipe. (I'm not sure it will hold gingerbread houses together, but perfect for sugar cookies.) big success! Yay!

I could care less if this is scientifically classified as a glaze, royal or whatever, this was a great icing for cut out cookies! It was a tiny bit thicker than I would have liked, so I added a touch of milk to get it to my liking :) It hardened up nicely and had a really pretty shine to it, very nice!

The frosting was great! You can easily adjust the thickness and choose the flavor. The end result is a shiny, flavorful layer on top of your favorite cookie recipe. Bonus! No egg whites either dried or fresh so can be used for children and pregnant women.

Sure the icing is glossy and hardens nice but what does it taste like? IThe icing tasted like soap with the almond extract. It was way too overpowering and I followed the recipe exactly only adding more powered sugar to thicken it. Won't do that again. Back to the tried and true Royal Icing.

I really like this recipe. I use lemon extract and the flavor is great. I'm just wondering if anybody has tried freezing the cookies after using this icing. Does it change the flavor?

It works and tastes great. Taste tons better than the "Original" Royal Icing recipes. My son is severely allergic to Raw Eggs. He is ok as long as the egg is baked in a baked good but any form of raw egg whether pasteurized, dehydrated, etc. Will cause a severe reaction. This recipe is Perfect for everything we wanted to do with our sugar cookies. God Bless you for sharing this life saver recipe.

Awesome! I love that it has no eggs in it and it hardens very nicely and tastes pretty good!

I make this icing every year at Christmas time for my children and I to decorate the gingerbread ornaments we make. I LOVE how it doesn't have egg in and it tastes great. It dries hard like royal icing as well.

I used this recipe to decorate Easter cookies and they turned out well. The original recipe was quite thick and perfect for edging, I did thin it for filling the cookies, everything turned out well I would use this again.

Love it, quick and easy to work with.

I made this icing with a few changes Add half tablespoon more of corn syrup Heat CS and water on stove just until bubbles appear . Transfer to stand mixer Nd mix on high for 1 min add PS and 1 tablespoon of lemon juice Mix in high for 4 mins. Turned out great drying time is a little longer but Was very shiny alone or airbrushed

This was a very nice icing. It might not be a true "Royal" frosting, but it was a fabulous egg-free option that worked nicely for our gingerbread houses. It hardened quickly and adhered well. I'll definitely use this recipe again for cookies and next year's gingerbread house.

Added 3x the almond extract

Great recipe for cookies without egg whites or merinque powder.

Awesome!!! I used about 4 extra spoonfuls of confectioners sugar and it hardened within 5 minutes. It is an amazing recipe.

In order to make it a bit easier to put on my bear claws I just held my kitchen aid bowl over the gas stove to make it more liquidy. I didn't want to add more water because I wanted to be sure it set hard.

This was easy to work with and looks good. Dont think the taste is 5 star, but I was really going for a certain look and this was a perfect recipe for that.

This glossy royal icing is great. After making the complete batch I removed 6 tablespoons to use as my flood icing then added 1/3 of a cup more powdered sugar to what was left in my mixing bowl to make it a bit thicker to use for my piping. It turned out absolutely perfect.

This is the perfect frosting/glaze for sugar cookies! And tastes so much better than royal icing but dries just like royal icing! So thank you for such a super easy great tasting glaze/frosting!!!!

I used this to frost gingerbread cookies, and it worked perfectly! I used orange extract instead of almond. I used a combination of gel and water-based food colorings to make red, yellow, and black. I made the base frosting thicker so I could pipe on my edges first, then added water by 1/4 tsp at a time until it was thin enough to fill in. It hardened nicely, tasted great, and looks beautiful! It added just the right amount of sweetness to my cookies. I had never even decorated cookies before, but this worked easily enough that my co-workers have been raving about them. One is even thinking about hiring me to make another batch for her grandson's birthday!

Flawless!!!

Worked beautifully and stayed glossy like stated. It took gel coloring well also. I put it into a squeeze bottle and let my kids go to town making free form stars to decorate our Dallas Cowboy cupcakes! I will use this recipe again!

This is an icing that is great for cookies as it flows. Tasted good too! However, I wanted it for cupcakes so I added 1/2 cup of confectioners to it and then sprinkled water as mixing until the right consistency. As it is, it flows off the cupcakes and is somewhat thin.

Perfect to ice Holiday cookies.

This recipe is great!! Works like a charm every time. Fool proof.

I love this icing. It tastes great it hardens nicely and best of all I'm not serving raw eggs to my kids classmates.

I made this last week and even my husband (who isn't an icing/frosting fan) loved it!

This is my first time making a royal icing. I saw a friend's sugar cookie icing and it was so shiny and pretty! I normally make a vanilla buttercream, but my girls' and I were making gingerbread cookies and knew I had to find a recipe and I chose this one. I have found that this is much easier to work with for cookie decorating (why haven't I found this and figure this out sooner)! I flavored the icing with clear vanilla, so the white stays white. After tasting the icing, I was worried that it was too plain (once again, I love a rich buttercream icing), but I carried on. What I love about this icing is that no matter how you spread it ( uneven like), it smooths out perfectly! I found that if the consistency is off, you can always add more water or powdered sugar to correct it! I also found that if you make this thicker to use for piping, this is the best way to put the icing on! I started with a knife at first (it was fine, but the edges were messy). I am sure most of you know that already! My girls loved decorating with this icing and said it was a lot easier for them to use! When it comes to taste, like I mentioned before, I thought it may be too plain. However, with gingerbread cookies, this icing tastes amazing! I was surprised! I am not sure this particular recipe would complement the sugar cookies, but I will definitely use it and update this post (if I can remember)!

This recipe is wonderful! The corn syrup makes for a pliable frosting, easy to flood - or, with a little more sugar, easy to pipe. I also appreciatiate the ability to change flavorings. This one’s a keeper!

Made as stated in recipe and my Easter egg cookies came out beautifully. Really like the shine it leaves and you don't break your teeth biting into the cookies

This icing is a bit more difficult to work with than the traditional royal icing as it's slightly more gooey but it leaves the beautiful shine that I have been trying to get for my cookies. It dries just as hard so the cookies can be packed in cellophane bags without any damage. Tastes just like the royal icing as well with the proper added extract. Thank you for a great recipe!

Loved the high gloss of this icing. It dried well too. After trying many recipes, this one is the keeper.

I made this but it was really thick and hard to work with. I made it to decorate sugar cookies. It was my first time making cookies and royal icing. So maybe its supposed to be this thick. I ended up adding water so I could decorate the cookies. I followed the directions except I only had vanilla extract so I used it instead of what the recipe called for. It tasted ok just like sugar.

Great, easy, & tasty! I love this recipe! !

I tried this recipe because of the good ratings but this is a glaze, not icing. I needed to make decorations with it and it was too clear and runny, I even tried adding more powdered sugar and that didn't work. If you need a glaze, this is the go to recipe. For decorating, the original royal icing recipe wins.

Turned out as expected nice glossy finish!

As someone else pointed out, this is more of a glaze than royal icing. It tastes delicious but even with added confectioner's sugar it was too thin.

most My family loved it. I didn't. I wanted to make a icing for some sugar cookies i think i added too much almond extract

Great my kids loved this icing..we hate royal icing..hard as a rock and tastes nasty....I wish I would have found this recipe long time ago

This recipe is wonderful! The corn syrup makes for a pliable frosting, easy to flood - or, with a little more sugar, easy to pipe. I also appreciatiate the ability to change flavorings. This one’s a keeper!

Worked great for what I needed, but I did have to add almost an extra cup of powdered sugar to get it thick enough.

I made three consecutive batches of this for my iddy-biddy Sunday kiddies, and all three were perfect. The wee kids could easily use this icing for their little houses. Thank you for sharing this.

I added a little more almond extract, but this recipe is amazing. I use it to ice cookies and Rice Krispies.

A delight! I put a layer on a salad plate, used gel food coloring, patterned the colors with a toothpick, and dipped the baked cut-out butter cookies in to create a marbled frosting. Having it more liquid as the basic recipe marbled colors great and dried very level. I decorated a ton of cookies fast. This is a fantastic way to decorate cookies and brought so much joy this Christmas.

Worst glaze/icing I've ever tried. I followed the directions exactly. However, even following the directions exactly as described in the instructions, the glaze/icing was way too runny and I ended up having to use a lot of powdered/confectioners sugar to thicken it up to a decent consitancy to make the border around my cookies. Even before thickend the glaze I did a trial cookie and the icing was too runny and on top of that even when it dried.....it was NOT glossy at all. It still had a matte finish. I will not be using this recipe again

I love the glossy finish. I doubled the extract. It tasted too much like "powdered sugar" to me. I didn't finish it, so it is in the fridge as directed. We shall see how it works tomorrow.

It was exactly what I needed to finish off my Valentines cookies!

This recipe is fantastic, I used it on shaped sugar cookies for an office party and everybody loved them! Several people asked for the recipe. Super easy to make, tastes great and saves and reuses great.

Runny, glaze sort of icing.....ran all over cookie:(

I always get complemented on this frosting - it's lovely and tasty!

I added some lemon zest to a vanilla extract base and liked it. I have not tried with the almond yet as my friends had allergies to almonds It is good though, if you take too long, it forms a "skin" on the icing but stir a little and it will work again. We just dipped the front of the cookies in it and it fills it itself while resting. Will use again on my sugar cookies.

No changes. It's perfect. Good coverage. Good consistency. Good flavor.

This is the only royal icing recipe I use anymore. I use it for decorating cookies, for making royal icing transfers for cakes, and I even use it to build gingerbread houses at Christmas time. It's perfectly glossy, it sets up nice and firm, it tastes pretty good (I usually add a touch of vanilla extract and a pinch of salt for even better flavor), and it colors wonderfully. Can't say enough good about it!

Perfect ! Dried glossy and smooth and was so easy to make. Thanks for sharing this great recipe.

Dries fast and tasted fine. I used maple extract on gingerbread cookies. I had to experiment to get the thickness just right to pipe but it all went well once I figured it out.

No changes - excellent recipe - but I wish there were weight measurements instead of volume, as a tiny difference in the water to powdered sugar ratio can easily throw this recipe off.

this is the 3rd year in a row that I have used this recipe for my Christmas cookies, love it, thank you!!

To thin!!! I had to add an extra 1.5 cups of sugar to help thicken it!

Love this. Perfect to thin down and just poor

This royal icing was OUT OF THIS WORLD! It was glossy and I loved serving it to my daughters classmates...she came home and was so exited that everyone loved her cookies! I am totally using this again!

So good! Will definetly make it again!!!

Made it, loved it, my new go to recipe!!!

This is an excellent glossy royal icing. It took a little while to dry since we live in a humid area, but it looked amazing on our Christmas cookies. It had a nice shine to it.

This icing is awesome! Love the glossy look to it, very kid friendly.

LOVE! The kids kept saying how much they loved this icing and it was so easy to make and went on like a dream! THANK YOU!

Call this what you want, Icing, Glaze, Frosting whatever!! This recipe is AMAZING!!! I wanted a recipe that didn't use eggs or butter. Made it today. (12/11/21) It's great for cut out cookies. I didn't have corn syrup and substituted honey. The honey gave it a nice flavor. Following the directions given the icing was thick and stiff. I just added a little more water to get the consistency I wanted. Make sure you add your sprinkles, decorations as soon as you frost the cookie. It hardens fast!

I increased the almond extract to 1 teaspoon and added 1 teaspoon of high end vanilla. The recipe hardens quickly, but a few seconds in the microwave helps thin it easily to decorate cookies.

So easy to make. I've made this a couple of times and it's foolproof. Big hit with the almond flavoring.

I used vanilla flavoring and it was delicious.

Does what it's supposed to do, although as someone else already said, it's not icing but a glaze.

Instead of almond extract, I used vanilla I will most definitely make these again! They were so easy to make and so delicious!

Love love it......dries quick. ...taste great......

I even let my 4 year old use this frosting and it is amazingly beautiful!

I had a bakery for years. I wish I had this receipt then. This receipt is easy to make, use and it sets up fast. The only thing I am waiting to see is does the icing hold its color. What I mean is some royal icing the color sinks down in the icing so it gets a white look to the top. I will update.

I like that it doesn’t use egg whites so I can feed cookies to young children. It smooths out great, but piping details layered on top don’t stay crisp if you are doing fine detail work. Dries out great for individual packaging of cookies or stacking. Tastes fine. I didn’t have almond extract so I used vanilla extract instead.

It tasted good but never dried hard and cookies couldn't be stacked.

The batch I made was shiny for a short time once it dried, but after a short time went matte.

I gave this 5 stars for the ease of preparation and the nice glossy finish. Taste is closer to a 4. I probably will try a different flavoring next time; this batch I used Butter Rum. The orange would probably taste better. It does harden quickly so work fast! Cookies come out so pretty and professional looking. This took a gel coloring very well and just a drop of blue made a pretty light blue snowflake cookie

Love love this recipe made cookies for my little ones tutti frutti birthday. Cookies were a hit. Thanks for recipe

This was a perfect recipe for my sugar cookies. I used this recipe for cookies that i bagged in cellophane for my sons 2nd birthday. it dried fast and tasted great!

Wonderful recipe! Easy to use.

Add almond extract

I used this recipe to ice puppy cookies for my daughter. Beautiful result! Made as written I dipped the cookies for a lovely, smooth base. Then I added cocoa powder to what was left which thickened it to a perfect consistency for outlining and details. Both versions look fantastic and are ridiculously tasty! Thank you!

I make sugar cookies for almost every occasion and this recipe is the absolute best I've found! I get so many compliments and everyone wants my recipe! It's easy, dried fast and no egg whites!

This was used to decorate cookies for a baby shower. The result looked amazing ...very professional!

Great icing that I have made before, but this is NOT royal icing, which contains egg whites to produce a harder set. Again, there is nothing wrong with this icing, but this is a misleading recipe, especially if people are specifically looking for royal icing, which this is not.

It worked great for decorating but 3 of us really didn’t like the taste of the icing.

This recipe does not produce the effect as the photos show. I followed the recipe and found it to be very thin in coverage and not opaque on gingerbread. I added additional conf. sugar and food coloring but couldn’t get the opaque coverage shown in the pictures linked to this recipe.

Easy and fast

Very easy to make and hardens nicely. I added lemon juice to give it more flavor.