I started making more cookies covered with royal icing instead of fondant - my question is, how can I clean up smears, smudges and mistakes on royal icing? On fondant, I just used a q-tip and some alcohol or lemon extract and it cleaned up perfectly....this method doesn't work on royal icing and I've ended up throwing away (translate into eating) cookies with mistakes that wouldn't have been discarded if I had covered them in fondant! Any suggestions?

ruthi, if you get to them quick, you can pick it off with a toothpick, you might have to scrape away a bit of the flood or cookie, but probably could do it.

Royal is harder to clean up. I made a few mistakes last night and I'm not happy about it (I did resist the urge to eat the mistakes, YAH!!). Shiney is right, the toothpick trick works sometimes. When you're piping, if you make a mistake and smudge the royal into the already dried top coat you can try to wipe it off with a little water (I mean a little). Sometimes it works - especially if the color is light. The dark colors are the worse.

Hi Shiney, I haven't been around for a while but I'm back!!!

PEEVERLY!! How are you!!?? Looks like you and I have returned the same time. Great to 'see' you!

Shiney, I'll pm you so we can catch up!

Ruthi, bumping this thread up in case anyone else has a trick out there. Anyone??

Thanks for the info so far - I am okay with scooping up bits of royal on royal mistake-wise...even when the foundation is dry fondant. My bigger problem is coloring that gets on dried royal icing by mistake - say when I am trying to shine up royal icing piping on a royal-iced cookie and I accidentally smudge some of the luster onto the cookie itself instead of the piping I am trying to highlight. Or, when I am "painting" a royal icing stencil that I have applied to a royal iced cookie and some of the dust or liquid color gets on to the cookie - I end up not being able to use the cookie cause it is smeared and sloppy looking and I haven't been able to clean it up - with fondant as the base coat on the cookie it would be no big deal...a bit of alcohol on a swab wipes it right off, color and all. Royal icing on the other hand acts like a sponge and nothing cleans it....at least nothing I have tried. So I am hoping someone on cc has a tip or technique to either remove the stain or cover it up???