Icing 101 – A Guide To Different Types Of Icings

Frosting is the icing on the cake! Literally! It’s a delicious mix of ingredients that add sweetness, texture, eye-appeal, but also a way to add personality to your treats from simple to ornate.

A plethora of many icings are used to decorate

• cake
• cupcakes
• cookies
• brownies
• pies
• cheesecakes and more
• donuts

From a thin runny icing to a sugar dough there are many different icings with different viscosities and mediums that can complete and be used to decorate many sweets.

Buttercream

One of the most popular icings and most versatile. It’s soft, spreadable, creamy, fluffy, smooth and is not too sweet. It holds its shape perfectly. Its most basic recipe is made of butter and confectioners sugar, but there are quite a few variants such as

• American
• Italian
• Swiss
• Ermine
• French
• German

Add a multitude of flavorings and colors to create the perfect cake and icing combination. It then can be used to fill cakes, ice cakes and cupcakes and can be used to pipe beautiful designs and flowers.

Royal Icing

One of the most popular icings to decorate sugar cookies. It’s very sweet and is made with egg whites or a meringue powder and confectioners sugar. It dries hard and quite fast, plus it can be made as a pourable consistency to a hard pipeable icing to create intricate designs on cookies and cakes.

Whipped Cream

Just whipped heavy cream and confectioners sugar, this is fresh, light, airy, fluffy, creamy and not too sweet. Mainly used to complement pies, this can also be used to ice and decorate cakes and cupcakes, the most popular being the strawberry shortcake. Stabilize it with gelatin to create a lasting, more firm cream that won’t melt as easily or get all goopy as it sits for a while. Flavor it with extracts to make exciting flavor combinations.

Ganache

Rich, smooth, and definitely chocolaty, ganache can be used in a variety of ways. Use as a glaze, filling, icing, sauce or even make candies. Just heavy cream and chocolate make up this decadent mixture!

Make it thinner for a glaze consistency, or whip it to make it firm and fluffy to ice and decorate cakes, cupcakes and brownies.

Confectioners Glaze

Confectioners sugar and milk or water make up this super sweet pourable glaze. Drizzled over pastries, cakes, cookies, donuts and other sweet treats, this icing is liquid and can be made thinner or thicker depending on how much milk or water is used. A perfect quick, easy icing.

Fondant

A sugar dough, the texture of that being like play-dough, made up of sugar, water, and sometimes gelatin and glycerine to make it pliable. It’s soft, sweet and a bit chewy and is generally used to cover cakes to make them look smooth and flawless. Because of its clay like nature, it’s easy to shape and make edible decorations for cakes and cupcakes

Cream Cheese Icing

Cream cheese, butter and confectioners sugar make up this crazy delicious icing. It’s dense, thick and fluffy all at the same time with a slight tang from the cream cheese. The traditional icing to cover cinnamon rolls, carrot cakes, and red velvet cakes, although it complements about any sweet! It can be a bit soft, perfect for cinnamon rolls, or by adding a larger butter to cream cheese ratio, the sturdier the icing will get. Perfect for icing and decorating cakes and cupcakes.

Seven Minute Icing

This icing is essentially a meringue. Egg whites with the addition of sugar are heated over a double boiler and then whipped until extremely fluffy. Kind of like a marshmallow fluff without all the stickiness making it melt in your mouth. Soft, pillowy, light, and airy, this icing is heavenly. Ice angel food cakes, cupcakes, cookies and other sweets with this amazing icing.

Conclusion

You can’t get much sweeter than icing, and there are many types to complement just about any sweet treat. Some are straightforward and some take a bit of effort to make, but regardless of what you choose, they’re all a sweet ending! Learn more about Icing!