Recipes

Basic, Easy, Traditional Royal Icing Recipe, Three Ingredients, Perfect for Gingerbread House Construction

I’m going to skip the fluff and get right to the recipe.  

After all, that’s what you came here for, right?  

Not some long drawn-out explanation of why and where, and all that stuff that so many blogs have. 

My family has used this recipe for years and years, and years…and it has always turned out and made our gingerbread house making parties a success! 

How to Make Royal Icing 

3 Egg Whites 

½ teaspoon Cream of Tartar 

1 16 oz bag or 4 cups of powdered sugar  

  • Separate egg whites from yolks, being extremely careful not to get any yolk in the whites. 
  • Beat egg whites on medium speed in mixer until they are glossy. They should form stiff peaks when you lift the beater out. (Pro tip-make sure that your bowl is perfectly clean and doesn’t have any traces of oil or grease in it. This will affect how your egg whites beat.) 
  • Mix cream of tartar with the powdered sugar. Gradually add the sugar into the eggs while mixing well. Go slowly while doing this, and be ready for a powdered sugar cloud if you go too fast! 

If you have an icing bag, you can use that, or put the icing into a quart Ziploc bags, cut a small bit off of one corner and use that instead. 

This is the way that I have always done it.

Then you can give everyone their own bag of icing and it goes around nicely.

You can also separate some icing and mix some green or red food coloring into it, for some fun effects. 

And there you have it! I have whipped up a second batch in the same bowl a little later, and it has been just fine. 

Of course, as with anything using raw egg, use your best judgement and be careful about eating the icing. 

My family on the other hand, have never had a problem even while eating the icing weeks later, when we devour our creations. But that’s just us… 

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