A few weeks ago, a group of us took a lesson on decorating cookies with Royal Icing, a skill I have been wanting to acquire.

For those who are asking, “WTF is Royal Icing?”, let me explain.  Royal Icing is a very smooth frosting/icing, that people use to decorate cakes and cookies, creating a flat surface or raised decorations on top of the flat surface.  The icing is almost thin enough to spread smoothly, but thick enough to create and maintain raised decorations or borders when dry.

It is not a quick process.  It took us each 2 hours to decorate 10 cookies. 

The young ‘uns created beautiful examples.  Us older folks struggled a bit more.  And mine, admittedly, looked like they were made by someone of (a lot) less than average abilities. 

But we are not giving up! 

Some of us got together and tried on our own.  Sans teacher. Again, the youngsters outshone the rest of us by far. 

I can’t even say mine were even a little bit better than before.

ARGH.

But I am not giving up!

I want to do this. I know I can master this skill.  And I am learning each time.  Granted nobody is going to call me a quick study on this, but I am one stubborn fat old lady.

One thing I learned is the most important thing about working with Royal Icing is the consistency.  Not too wet (or it will blend too easily and not give you clean lines) and not too dry – or the surface ends up all bumpeldy, rather than smooth as a baby’s ass.

I also realize that I try to do too much decorating on each cookie.  A nice clean minimalist approach is best; at least for the time being.  Pick a design and live with it. Cookies with everything but the kitchen sink thrown at them, look like they should be thrown in the kitchen sink.  Preferably one with a working disposal unit.

I now have an impressive collection of cookie cutters, and I know how to make my cookies nice and flat, so you have a good working surface.  Next step is trying to make my own Royal Icing that is just right – and to learn how to apply it neatly. 

So if you are longing for cookies, I will probably always have a stock of plain sugar cookies that I am practicing on.  Some plain and some (poorly) decorated. 

I’ll provide an update when I start getting a handle on this.