What's the difference between a glaze and the royal icing? - Page 2

Originally Posted by Lambshack

I don't exactly use a recipe as its more of a 'look & see' kinda thing for me, but if I had to break it down it would be something close to this.

I use the large 2 lb. bags of powdered sugar, and then 1/2 cup of milk and 1/2 cup corn syrup, with anywhere from 1tsp to 1Tbsp of extract. Sometimes I will use a little lemon juice and less milk, or even orange juice, but that sometimes conflicts with mixing colors.

I always add a few squirts of the liquid white coloring once combined to get that opaque look, although if you are mixing dark colors you won't need this. When I had to make a ton of milk bottle cookies, I left the white out so it would look 'milky'. (It worked!)

Obviously, depending on where you live and how 'fresh' your sugar is, there might be more moisture - just like flour - so you will need more or less liquid. Some people 'count' while it dribbles off a spoon... can't really do that, but you will quickly learn when its too thick or too runny.

I use small bowls (like the Chinese soup takeout containers) and a very tapered spoon - my favorite is one that came with a cheap mug & cocoa holiday gift set! It doesn't have a big 'bowl' to it - really flat - like a really cheap spoon at a really old diner? Does that make sense? But its tiny like a demitasse spoon and I just scoop up some glaze with the spoon and use the BACK of the spoon to sorta push it and guide it to the edges. If its too runny you will know because the glaze won't stop at the edge. The corn syrup helps tremendously with this part. Makes it just thin enough to spread but not to run off the edge. I can't tell you how many DAYS, possibly months of time this process has saved me on some HUGE orders. 600 cookies for Mother's Day at a country club would have taken forever to border and fill. Not to mention would have gotten stale before I had a chance to finish them! LOL

I hope this helps in some small way!
Happy glazing!
Lisa

Originally Posted by GeminiRJ

I ALWAYS add brite white to the icing, regardless of the colors to be added, because this icing doesn't like to get cold, especially while it's drying. The white food color will help prevent spotting and crackling of the icing. You can also use water instead of milk, but I had more problems with colors bleeding while using water. (Again, adding the brite white seems to help with preventing some bleeding).

Originally Posted by bonniebakes

I use Antonia74's icing recipe (royal) with the addition of a little bit of corn syrup. It does dry hard enough to stack and bag, but it does NOT dry to be "rock hard" like you would think if RI for a gingerbread house. The cookie keeps it soft inside.. no cracking teeth!

Here are some past threads about royal and glace...

glace & royal
http://www.cakecentral.com/cake-decorating-ftopict-623143.html

http://www.cakecentral.com/cake-decorating-ftopict-623816.html

Originally Posted by bonniebakes

Chippi -

I believe the link is in her article (Antonia74s article
http://www.cakecentral.com/article54-How-To-Bake--Decorate-Cookies.html) as well as the recipe section here on CC.

I started using a little corn syrup waaaaaayyyy (at least a year) after I started using that RI recipe and the only difference I, or anyone else, have noticed is that it is a little less matte in appearance when dry. The texture, consistency, drying time, etc. area all the same as without the corn syrup.

I usually let it mix for about 7 minutes, then add in the corn syrup while it's still mixing for the last 3 minutes. There's no exact science to it - I've added it at the very beginning, too - especially if I'm adding a lot of corn syrup for more shine (which I have done with up to 1/2 of the water called for in the recipe). I just like to be sure it is well incorporated.