Vegan royal icing that dries hard and is suitable to decorate sugar cookies with, can hold together a gingerbread house or decorate a cake, and is easily colored, flavored, and manipulated to suit your needs.
Scroll down to get the recipe or just take a look at the video here if you prefer that method:
Equipment:
So here are the things you’ll need:
Stand mixer with the balloon whisk attachment OR hand mixer with a large bowl
Rubber/silicone spatula (more than one is preferred if you’ll be mixing multiple colors)
Ingredients:
One can of garbanzo beans
Vegan powdered/confectioner’s sugar
Vinegar, lemon juice, or cream of tartar
Water or lemon juice
Gel or powdered food coloring, if using
The Method
The method is really quite simple:
1. Drain (and keep!) the water from your garbanzo beans. This is known as “aquafaba” and is our egg white substitute in this recipe. Put the beans away for something else.
2. Add the aquafaba to your mixing bowl. The rest can be put into the fridge for up to a week or the freezer for three months.
3. Add the vinegar (or cream of tartar or lemon juice if you don’t have it) and mix with a whisk attachment (you’ll see in my photos I have the paddle attachment connected – these photos are from before I knew better) just until frothy.
4. Add about a pound of powdered (confectioner’s) sugar to the bowl, and mix on low until incorporated.
5. Mixing on low, adding more sugar until the mixture is about the consistency of school glue. Add in your 1 tsp of vanilla and white gel coloring once you reach this consistency.
6. Turn your mixer on medium high and let it go for about 8 minutes. You’ll end up with the perfect stiff consistency royal icing for piping words and fine details.
7. Thin your royal icing with water or fresh lemon juice (my favorite) to desired consistency. Thicken it with powdered sugar if you need to pipe flowers, use stencils, or glue gingerbread. You can also add any gel or powdered food color at this stage. I’ll add another post later getting more into coloring and consistencies, so be on the lookout for that.
That’s it! It’s that easy! You can keep the prepared icing at room temperature in a sealed container or bag for up to a week, in the fridge for a month, or in the freezer for pretty much forever. Just make sure to stir it well before you use as the water will start to separate from the marshmallow fluff you’ve created.
Consistency Tutorial:
This recipe will make AT LEAST a couple dozen cookies’ worth of icing. Us cookiers are always making too much icing because we really have no idea how many cookies it covers. Lol.
Have fun and please share your creations with me on Facebook!
Pin it for later:
Vegan Royal Icing
An eggless royal icing made with aquafaba. It can be used in all the same ways as tradition egg white royal, including decorating cookies, gluing gingerbread houses, decorating cakes, and making sprinkles and royal icing transfers.
Prep Time 12 minutes
Total Time 12 minutes
-
1/4 cup
ish
Aquafaba
(the cooking or canned liquid from beans; I prefer garbanzo) -
1 lb
to start
Powdered/Confectioner’s Sugar
(up to one pound more depending on your needs) -
1 tsp
ish
Vinegar
(may be substituted with cream of tartar or lemon juice) -
1 tsp
ish
Vanilla
(I use clear for bright white icing, but you can use natural) -
1.5 tsp
ish
Gel or Powdered Food Coloring
(optional, though I always add AmeriColor Bright White to mine) - Water or Lemon Juice to thin prepared icing
-
Add about a teaspoon of vinegar to your mixing bowl
-
Pour in about a 1/4 cup of aquafaba
-
Mix on medium to high speed with a whisk attachment just until the top of your aquafaba is frothy/foamy
-
Turn off the mixer and add in a couple of cups of the powdered sugar.
-
Turn the mixer on low until the sugar is mostly incorporated into the aquafaba
-
Turn the mixer off and lift the whisk to check the consistency of your icing. We are trying to get a school-glue type consistency. If it’s not there yet, add more powdered sugar about a cup at a time until you achieve it
-
Once you achieve the school-glue consistency, add about a teaspoon of vanilla and a teaspoon and a half of white gel coloring (if you’re using it)
-
Turn the mixer up to medium-high speed and let it go for about eight minutes
-
After eight minutes or so, turn the mixer off. You should have nice, stiff royal icing! It’s perfect for coloring and thinning out to decorate cookies or thickening up for flowers, or using as is for writing and other fine detail work.
-
Store the icing in an airtight container right away – it dries out very quickly – at room temperature for up to a week, in the fridge for a month, or the freezer for pretty much as long as you want
Find a video tutorial on our YouTube channel!
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