I just made this icing, first time ever, for my cake course, and it's REALLY stiff. Is it suppose to be so stiff? I used 2 cups of shortening, and 8 cups of icing sugar, with 4 tbsp of milk. I just don't see how it will come out of the bag like this lol. I followed the directions, oh and I added 2 tsp of vanilla.... it doesn't taste very great... Perhaps I'm just use to the butter in the icing? This one we aren't suppose to use butter at all.

When I took a cake course we used a super stiff icing too. The instructor explained that it was so that what we were learning to pipe would hold and that if we substituted the recipe she'd know because anything else would be too soft. Just use if for the course as your "training icing" but you'll probably use something else for your other cakes because that stuff is super sweeeetttt. Have fun in class!!!

Sounds good! Thank you!

in my class we made thin, medium and stiff, like in the book, we really only used the stiff for roses,

When I recently took a Wilton class, you had to continue to add liquid to make the medium and thin consistency. The thick consistency was the starting point. We used the thick to make the center of the rose, and medium to make the petals and to do some piping. We used thin to pipe, and mixed with piping gel to write and scroll. Apparently the recipe was created before they changed the consistency of the shortening. You will have to had teaspoons of water/milk at a time to get the consistency you like. Also did you add any meringue powder or salt? that helps with flavor

My instructor told us to make it stiff and wait until we got to class and she would see if it needed to be thinned. Easy to thin but not so easy to get back to stiff. As it turned out we always had to thin it in class. HTH

Thanks! I did add the meringue powder. I let it mix for a bit in the mixer and that has seemed to help. Yes, it is just for the roses. I also made Medium and Thin for the other projects.