Baking question.

[Baitball Blogger]

Just made some butt-kicking Valentine cookies and it just dawned on me that I may have made a mistake with the icing. Ingredients are

1 cup confectioner sugar
2 teaspoon milk
2 teaspoon cornsyrup
1/4 tsp almond extract.

Cookies taste delicious, but it occurred to me that I shouldn't have used that recipe because I was planning to mail them to people, and the milk now makes the cookie perishable.

Anyone have experience with this? Everyone that reviewed it at the website talks it up, and nobody mentions refrigeration.

This is where I got the recipe:

http://allrecipes.com/recipe/11587/sugar-cookie-icing/

[Wounded Bear]

1. Used to get cookies from home all the time...

back when I was in the service. Pretty sure the baking kills whatever bacteria lives in the milk.

Make sure you seal them well, of course. Think a metal canister with a tight fitting lid and well wrapped in plastic wrap. Maybe a good quality plastic container with air tight seal.

If not properly sealed you might get bugs. I remember one box I got with ants in it.

[Ptah]

2. Here''s something to consider:

Why do perishable ingredients such as butter, milk, or eggs no longer have to be refrigerated after they've been baked into a cake or cookies?

The proteins and fats have been cooked and thoroughly denatured, and most of the water content has been driven off, these two steps do the most to prevent the cookie from reacting with oxygen and going 'off.' Consider when eggs are pan fried and the liquid part of the egg changes color and solidifies -- that's thermal denaturing; what we called being 'cooked.' This turns the protein strands from a wildly wavy, unconnected net into a tight, coherent structure that can be picked up with a spatula and slid onto a piece of toast.

[kentauros]

3. However, in this case, it's an icing and it isn't cooked.

From the link given, the ingredients are only mixed together and nothing is heated.

The milk (and the cornstarch) is there to prevent the sugar from forming crystals due by adding fat content. Sugar is a natural preserver so long as the main ingredient is sugar and the moisture content is kept low. That's why candies hardly ever spoil.

If still worried about spoilage due to the milk content, refrigerate or freeze them. The only drawback here is from "sugar bloom" or when moisture collects on the surface and sugar dissolves. As this process repeats, it builds up into a white coating. Airtight wrapping prevents this from occurring.

[Ptah]

4. Looks like I read too fast.

Thanks for catching that.

[kentauros]

5. That's okay.

I spent fifteen minutes searching through Harold McGee's "On Food and Cooking" to no avail until I happened on the section for making candy. From there it all fell into place.

Great book; you should get it

[Baitball Blogger]

6. You people kick butt!

thanks a million!

[kentauros]

7. You're welcome :)

How long do you expect them to be kept un-eaten?

[Baitball Blogger]

9. My husband has already over-taste tested them.

I'm real curious about the ones where I put both vanilla and almond extract in the icing. Wonder if that will go over big?

[kentauros]

11. Vanilla and almond is a good combination.

I know at least one of my biscotti recipes uses both. That might be in the Orange-Almond recipe, but I'm not sure of it.

Vanilla pretty much compliments anything

[LiberalElite]

8. I was going to suggest the "Cooking & Baking" group under

Home & Family but it looks like you got it figured out.

[Baitball Blogger]

10. I was in a tight spot and needed a quick answer and I didn't know which group would respond faster.

Turned out that I didn't need to worry. Lots of Baking experts on Du.