Royal Icing 101
Everything you need to know about making the best royal icing to decorate your sugar cookies with.
Ingredients:
2 lb. bag of powdered sugar
3 T. powdered meringue
1 t. clear vanilla - artificial is best to keep the white color of the frosting
2 t. butter flavoring
2 t. almond flavoring (technically optional, but definitely preferred) - you can also use lemon or any other flavoring you prefer, but measurements may vary.
Instructions:
Mix dry ingredients. Add liquid ingredients to 1/2 cup of water. With the mixer running, pour liquid ingredients into the mixture slowly. It will look like nothing is happening, but be patient. Continue to mix the icing until all powdered sugar lumps have disappeared. The frosting will be at a fairly stiff consistency at this point. This makes quite a bit of icing, so if your cookie design doesn't require very much decorative piping on top you may consider making less. Any extra frosting can be refrigerated or even frozen. I add my coloring to the base icing before thinning - this way you can have a thicker outline icing and a thinner 'flood' icing in the same color. You can thin the icing with water, but it literally takes drops, so be very sparing.