Mary Berry's royal icing
- Prepare
- less than 30 mins
- Cook
- no cooking required
- Serve
- Makes enough for a 20cm/8in cake
- Dietary
- Dairy-freeNut-freeVegetarian
Everyone's favourite baker, Mary Berry, gives you the lowdown on making the perfect royal icing. Homemade royal icing sets softer than ready-made or premixed icing sugar and is much nicer to eat.
If you haven't made royal icing before it's surprisingly easy but still worth watching the recipe video before you start as there's some tips and visual references that will be useful.
By Mary Berry
From Saturday Kitchen
Ingredients
- 675g/1½lb icing sugar
- 3 free-range egg whites
- 3 tsp lemon juice
- 1½ tsp glycerine
- extra egg white, to thin icing, if required
Method
Sieve the icing sugar.
Whisk the egg whites in a large bowl until they become frothy.
Add the icing sugar to the egg whites, a spoonful at a time, mixing well between each addition.
Add the lemon juice and glycerine and stir.
Beat the icing until it is very stiff and white and stands up in peaks.
Spread over the top and sides of the cake and rough up the icing with a spatula so that it forms peaks. (If you want a smooth icing you may need to thin the icing down a little with more egg white and use to ice the sides and top of the cake using a palette knife.)
Transfer to a cake tin and seal up until ready for use.
Recipe tips
If you have a freestanding mixer, dust it off to use in this recipe. It's convenient to use it with the whisk attachment as you can keep the motor running as you add the icing sugar.
