4 Ways to Decorate Sugar Cookies
This guide provides a classic recipe for royal icing made with meringue powder and confectioners' sugar, perfect for decorating baked sugar cookies. It details four distinct methods for applying the icing, including basic outlining and flooding, creating layered designs, working with separate colour sections, and using sprinkles. The instructions ensure your cookies are beautifully decorated and set properly, taking about 2 hours to dry completely at room temperature.
Ingredients
- 1 batch sugar cookies, baked & cooled
- 4 cups (480g) confectioners’ sugar, sifted (I use and recommend Domino brand)
- 3 Tablespoons meringue powder (not plain egg white powder)
- 9–10 Tablespoons room-temperature water
- optional for decorating: gel food coloring (I love this food coloring kit)
Method
- Ensure your sugar cookies are baked and fully cooled. You can use any preferred sugar cookie recipe. This quantity of icing is sufficient for approximately 2 dozen cookies.
- Combine the sifted confectioners' sugar, meringue powder, and 9 Tablespoons of water in a large mixing bowl. Beat the mixture for 1.5–2 minutes using a hand or stand mixer with a whisk attachment. The icing should drizzle from the whisk and smooth out within 5–10 seconds. If it appears too thick, incorporate additional water 1 Tablespoon at a time. Typically, 10 Tablespoons are needed, though 12–14 Tablespoons may be required on very dry days. Remember that extended beating thickens the icing. For thin icing, continue beating or mix in more sifted confectioners' sugar.
- To colour the icing, separate it into bowls for different hues or tint the entire batch one colour. Introduce gel food colouring gradually using a toothpick, stirring it in. Add more colour to achieve the desired shade. Stirring thickens the icing. add a few drops of water if needed to maintain the correct consistency.
- Attach a small round piping tip, like Wilton #4, to a pastry bag, using a coupler if you intend to change tips or colours. Fill the bag with icing, leaving a few inches of space at the top, then twist it closed or use a clip.
- Proceed with any of the following decorating methods, then continue to step 10.
- Using a small round tip such as Wilton #4, pipe an icing outline around the edge of your cookie. Fill the interior of this outline with more icing. You may add sprinkles immediately before the icing sets.
- First, pipe and flood the cookie with a base layer of icing as described. Allow this layer to set for 1–2 hours. Once dry, use a smaller tip like Wilton #2 to pipe additional details such as swirls, handwriting, or dots onto the set base. Let this second layer dry completely before stacking or storing the cookies.
- This method creates dimensional decoration and prevents colours from bleeding. Begin with one colour and, using Wilton tip #4, pipe every other section of your cookie design. Let this icing begin to set for at least 30 minutes. Once it is semi-set, fill the remaining sections with icing. For the pictured cookies, the centre and two sides were piped separately with space between them.
- This technique achieves a sectioned look without the 30-minute wait. With Wilton tip #4, pipe icing onto the section you wish to cover with sprinkles or sparkling sugar. Immediately dip the cookie into the sprinkles to coat the wet icing. Afterwards, pipe icing onto the remaining sections of the cookie.
- A thin layer of royal icing will dry completely in about 2 hours at room temperature. Runny or very thick applications will require longer drying times. To accelerate setting for layered designs, you can place the decorated cookies in the refrigerator.
Nutrition (per serving)
Nutrition data not available.
Recipe details
CategoryDessert
Cuisineamerican
AuthorSally
