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After making a gingerbread house yesterday, we have some leftover royal icing (I only made 1 egg's worth, but it was still too much). How should this be stored for a few days?

While dried royal icing is clearly suitable for room-temperature storage, I'm not sure if the same hold when it's still wet (in a sturdy plastic piping bag).

In case it makes a difference, the egg I used was unwashed and unrefrigerated, as is normal here (though this one came from a household flock of hens not a shop). Also it was a stiff construction royal icing - egg white and sugar just stirred vigorously together, with a little water added as it was too stiff at first.

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  • In my old days, I’d make it into things, let them dry, and then store them. So I’d have decorations I could pop out when i found out at the last minute that it was someone’s birthday at the office, and use them to decorate cupcakes. But I also seemed to have more free time when I did a lot of cake decorating
    – Joe
    Dec 6, 2021 at 20:30
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    @Joe lack of time was my main motivation for storing. And lack of energy, having made and decorated a gingerbread house from scratch (and pizza for dinner) with a child, and then had to clear up. It turns out I quite enjoy it still soft on the leftover bits of rather hard construction gingerbread (must bake the leftovers a bit less next year)
    – Chris H
    Dec 6, 2021 at 20:33

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I was hoping for something definitive, but for completeness, this is what worked for me: I kept it in the plastic piping bag at room temperature.

It dried at the open end where I'd been piping, but after breaking off the dried bit it was still usable a few days later and tasted as it should. It's essentially pure sugar, so the water activity should be too low for it to spoil - it's not surprising that it kept well.

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  • I'm still hoping some something better, but at least it's now not unanswered
    – Chris H
    Dec 16, 2021 at 13:11
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    I’ve never tried to store royal icing, but for other types of frosting, you can get covers for the couplers for your bags (couplers being the plastic bit that goes inside the bag, then has a threaded ring so you can change out tips while the bag is full). If you leave a little bit of slightly damp paper towel in the cover, it’ll keep the frosting from drying out for a few days)
    – Joe
    Dec 16, 2021 at 17:44

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