Well I tried to make RI snowflakes last night and boy did they not work out!!! I used the regular meringue powder recipe and piped them on to wax paper. First of all, I'm not sure if I used the right size tip. I used a 3, put it was really hard to get nice straight lines. Every place I started or stopped had a big blob of icing. Then there were all of these peaks of icing where I would end a line. Does this happen to everyone? I see so many beautiful cakes on this site covered in amazing snowflakes!!! I really wanted to make this for my family Christmas Eve dinner, but I don't think its gonna work out. Does anyone have any tips? What is the best recipe to do this? The right tip? Do you need to do more than one layer to make them sturdier? Anything else that might be helpful?

Thanks.

You are always gonna have the little "peaks" when you left up with royal icing, at least I always do! Your best bet is to have a little thing of water and a small paint brush, dip the brush in the water, dab it off so it is just damp, then just tap the peaks lightly. I think I used a tip 2 to do my snowflakes and I think I did 2 layers, but don't quote me on that! I just used the Wilton recipe probably, cause that's all I knew at the time. Hope some of this helps!

suzie1962
i'm so glad you posted this question as i was piping some ri snowflakes myself last nite and was less than happy with them. i used a #2 tip and patted down the intersections of icing to reduce the bulk but they don't look near as nice as others i've seen here on cc. hopefully we'll get some pointers from some of the pros out there!

practice ladies, practice.

In culinary school we would be told to stand at the worktable and do these (well other actual designs, but you get the idea) for a hour. You'd be surprised at how good you get after you've made a thousand of them.

I made my snowflakes and they turned out greaat for the first time. I was out of wax paper so I made them on top of saran wrap instead. They turned out fantastic. I used a tip #2. They were much easier to take off of the plastic wrap with a spatula. I think I will use plastic wrap from now on.

Check the consistency of you icing, you dont want it too runny.. That would help with the blobs..Be careful too an how much press at the begining and end of them..Practice makes perfect as you will start learning how to work with your bag. This will help you with swirls too, but only practice will help..
Edna

For piping with RI, parchment paper= must have! When you allow the RI to dry completely, it almost floats on top of the parchmemnt, very little, most often no effort is needed to release them from the paper. They slide right off with no sticking. Piping designs with lines that meet is tricky. You have to practice and learn when to stop applying pressure to the bag so that at juuuuust the right time, the stream of RI stops flowing out as you join one line to another. Almost drag the last bit to join it to the next section. With practice, it is hard to tell where you make the joints at all. Very hard to describe, but super simple once you master it.

I have only tried the recipe for RI that comes with the instructions in the Wilton meringue package. I used tips 2 and 3, didn't try 1, as it would have been way too thick, I would imagine. Like someone else mentioned...practice practice! Eventually those peaks and blobs where lines meet won't be an issue!