Icing rewards a little know-how: how to choose it, cook it, store it, and substitute in a pinch. Browse 21 recipes to cook with it.

What is icing?

Icing is a thin, glossy sugar coating that you pour or pipe over baked goods and then let set hard. At its simplest it is powdered sugar loosened with a little liquid, sometimes bound with egg white.

It dries to a smooth, often shiny shell rather than staying soft and spreadable.

That setting is the line between icing and frosting. Frosting is thick and fluffy and stays creamy because it is built on butter or cream cheese.

Icing is thinner and far lower in fat, and it is meant to harden, which is exactly what lets you stack decorated cookies or ship a gingerbread house without smearing.

If you can pipe a sharp line that stays put, you are working with icing. If you swirl a soft cloud, that is frosting.

Types and How to Use Them

Three kinds cover almost everything home bakers do.

Royal icing is powdered sugar whipped with egg white or meringue powder. It pipes crisp outlines and dries rock hard, so it is the classic for decorated sugar cookies and gingerbread. It carries the detail on Holiday Gingerbread Cookies and Hand Print Cookies and holds the candy on Oreo Turkeys.

A simple glace or powdered-sugar glaze is just sugar thinned with milk or lemon juice. It sets to a soft, semi-gloss finish, good drizzled over Pfeffernuesse or a bundt, or spread on Strawberry Cookies.

The third move is flooding, which uses royal icing at two consistencies. You pipe a stiffer border, then thin the rest with a few drops of water until it settles flat and fill the inside.

The border acts as a dam so the looser icing does not run off the edge.

Getting the Consistency Right

Consistency is everything with icing, and it turns on tiny amounts of liquid. For piping outlines you want toothpaste-thick icing that holds a peak.

For flooding you want it thinner, so a knife drawn through the surface heals and disappears in about ten seconds.

Adjust water a few drops at a time. Icing goes from too stiff to too runny in one careless splash, and there is no undo except adding more powdered sugar.

The most common failure is a crater where flood icing was too thin, ran over the dam, and pulled the whole layer with it. The fix is patience: pipe the border, let it crust for a minute, then flood.

The other frequent mistake is rushing the dry time. Royal icing looks set in 15 minutes but is not crush-proof for several hours, and a stacked or bagged cookie before then smudges. Give detailed work overnight to cure fully.

Substitutes

If a recipe calls for royal icing and you want to skip raw egg, meringue powder is the standard swap and behaves identically. A cooked alternative is a few tablespoons of corn syrup stirred into a powdered-sugar glaze, which adds gloss and a bit of set without egg.

For a quick glaze in place of any icing, whisk powdered sugar with just enough milk or lemon juice to make a pourable ribbon. It will not pipe fine lines, but it drizzles and sets soft.

When you actually need a soft, spreadable cap rather than a hard shell, reach for frosting instead. The two are not interchangeable: frosting will not dry firm enough to stack or ship.

Storing Icing

Powdered-sugar glaze is best made fresh and used the same day, since it starts to crust the moment it hits air.

Royal icing keeps better. Store it in an airtight container with plastic wrap pressed directly onto the surface, since the exposed top crusts within minutes. Refrigerated, it holds for up to two weeks; rewhip it briefly and adjust with a drop of water before using.

Cookies that are fully iced and cured store well at room temperature in a single layer or with parchment between layers. Avoid the fridge, where humidity softens the set surface and can make colors bleed.

Quick facts

In Chinese

积冰

British (UK) term

Icing

en français

glaçage

en español

formación de hielo

Recipes using icing

There are 21 recipes that contain this ingredient.

All 21 recipes