I recently purchased a 35 pound container of liquid shortening that I found for a lot cheaper than solid shortening at my local chain bulk store.

I tried making icing with it - and at first it was great! It was too stiff however, so I tried to add water to thin it down.

This did NOT work! It made the icing similar in consistency to cottage cheese. Upon tasting the icing in it's cottage cheese like state, I found that the "curdles" were actually clumps of powdered sugar.

I sift my sugar every time, so I'm not sure how this happened. It was fine before the water so there must be some kind of chemical reaction - for the baking chemists out there...

Anyway, I'm going to try and reduce my ratio this time.

I was using 1 part shortening to 2 parts sugar.

I'm going to try 1 part shortening to 1.5 parts sugar and see if that makes a difference in the consistency of the icing.

Any advice, or suggestions are very welcome!

Thanks, Sharon

I can't imagine that "liquid shortening" would work no matter what the ratio.

Sorry, never heard of this. Don,t think it can happen. But i don,t know everything. Hope you get your help.