This glossy, dairy-free white mountain frosting is perfect for cakes and cupcakes since it retains its shape well.
| Prep Time: | 10 mins |
| Cook Time: | 10 mins |
| Total Time: | 20 mins |
| Servings: | 32 |
| Yield: | 4 cups |
Ingredients
- 3 cups white sugar
- 1 cup water
- ¼ teaspoon cream of tartar
- 3 large egg whites
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 pinch salt
Instructions
- Stir sugar, water, and cream of tartar together in a saucepan over medium heat. Cover and bring to a boil, then uncover and cook until a candy thermometer reaches 238 degrees F (115 degrees C), 5 to 7 minutes; syrup should spin a long thread when dripped from a spoon.
- While the syrup is cooking, beat egg whites in the bowl of a stand mixer with the whisk attachment until stiff peaks form.
- When the syrup has reached temperature, slowly pour a thin stream into egg whites, beating constantly, until frosting stands in peaks. Stir in vanilla and salt.
- You can use any flavor extract instead of vanilla.
Reviews
This has always been my most favorite frosting, made a gluten free cherry nut cake topped with white mountain frosting. Yummy, happy Birthday to me
I have made this for years. It’s very much like a marshmallow cream/merengue. I wish I had found it this morning before I ran to the store for the corn syrup in my old recipe! That always throws me when I make it so infrequently. Love it for Angelfood Cake and fruit flavored cakes (like the Rainbow Cake flavored/colored with Jello).
I am going to try it again and see if the mistake was mine. It didn’t turn out as creamy as it was suppose to. I wonder if I cooked it to long…I will re rate it next time. 🙂
I have made this for over 40 years. It is a family favorite. I use 1/2 cup of sugar and 1/4 cup of corn syrup 2 egg whites and 1 teaspoon vanilla. It is in the Betty Crocker cookbook from back in the day. We just made it tonight!!
Awesome for cookies. Easy and tasty
NEVER EVER AGAIN TRIED TO MAKE IT TWICE IN CASE I MADE MISTAKE THIS RECIPE IS AWFUL
I tried this recipe 3 times and each time it didn’t turn out, I eventually went 1 cup of sugar, 1/3 cup of water and took out the salt. It came out light and sweet. I’m sorry but this recipe didn’t work out for me.
This is like the fluffy white frosting that I have made when my children were growing up. I cooked the syrup midway between softball and hardball stage on my candy thermometer. Meanwhile I whipped the egg whites to a very stiff peak. Very, very easy. I had more than enough to frost two layer chocolate cake. This icing and chocolate cake is incredibly delicious. My family loved it. Next time I may try to plan to have a few extra cupcakes in the freezer to frost with surplus frosting.
As a couple other people have said, I just could not get this to thicken. It was also way too sweet-which I never say about anything-so after I made it I searched for other marshmallow frosting recipes & they had about 1/2 the amount of sugar to egg white ratio.
Like the one mom used to make. Thanks for the receipe.
I followed the recipe exactly but for some reason it was extreamly runny. I tried to add more sugar to thicken it but it didn’t work.
7 stars.its one of my best result from your column.thank you very much
Followed directions, didn’t work for me, not sure what I did wrong. I whipped it for a long time but it never regained the stiff peaks, was way liquidy. Had to throw it away. Googled White Mountain Frosting and found a different recipe with different proportions of sugar/water, etc. and made it instead. It worked perfectly.
The best fluffy white frosting I’ve made in a long while. The sugar is easy to prepare, there is a huge amount of frosting, and it holds it’s consistency over many hours. I would rate it 5 stars for taste, ease of recipe preparation, and appearance.
This is just like marshmallow fluff.
LOVED THIS RECIPE! Tasted great and the iced a beautiful thick layer!!! Plan to use it many times in the future! Thanks!!!
This is the first time I ever made a frosting like this one. I was looking for a white fluffy frosting for my new years cake, like a cake I seen online. It’s light and fluffy and taste like marshmallow. Just what I was looking for. It was very good!!
It’s an excellent marshmallow frosting, with a very light vanilla taste. I may add more vanilla next time. Frost while it’s still quite warm to ensure it stays glossy. This recipe makes enough to frost 2 9″ layered cakes.
~HELP FOR THOSE WITHOUT THERM~ OK. This recipe was quite good. The reasons I didn’t give it a 5 star was just because it wasn’t really what I expected it to be. It was more of a marshmallow. Now, if I had used my brain and thought of the process and thought, yeah that’s how you make fluff, then I would have known. Unfortunately I don’t always use my brain the way I should when I am freaking out about finding a tasty vanilla frosting since I ran out of powdered sugar. I was a little worried about making the recipe since I had have recently broken my candy thermometer and I haven’t replaced it yet. So here is a bit of help for those without a thermometer. It will boil after a few minutes on high. Keep it at a really rolling boil, I like mine a few notches down from the highest heat, just for safety reasons. Its going to boil for a long long time. Then it will look white with bubbles, this does not mean it is done. Just because it is syrupy doesn’t mean it is done. Its got to get really nice and thick, and will look a bit yellow. It took me over 15 minutes to get it to this point, but it can take you longer or shorter. Good luck, I hope this helped some people. It is mildly hard to explain, some of it just comes with making this sort of thing a lot.
tasty:) mmmmmmm
Originally, I was just looking for a substitue for Seven Minute Frosting, and since I only have a stand mixer,this recipe seemed to fit the bill. I didn’t read any of the reviews, or perhaps I wouldn’t have tried it. And, initially, after the first taste from the bowl, I thought I’d made a mistake in making it. But now I’m not so sure… First of all, it’s marshmallow frosting, to the T! It’s sticky, gooey, and even my 4-year-old daughter thought it tasted just like marshmallow. I wasn’t too happy with that, since I was going for a light, airy frosting (like seven minute!) Anyway, I had made it, it came out correctly, so I slathered it on the dark chocolate cake we had made. The recipe makes a TON, but you’ll need it, because if you try to spread this too thin, you’ll be picking up cake like mad. Turns out, this recipe on dark chocolate cake—tastes like heaven! I’m not sure what it reminds me of, something like Sno Balls, but fresher and no coconut (although coconut on it would be awesome!) You can tell I’m a child of the 70s! Next time, though, I’ll make cupcakes (dark chocolate, of course). The cake really is quite hard to cut cleanly. I also don’t know yet how this will store–or even where to store it. For now it’ll stay on my counter. The only reason I gave it 4 stars instead of 5 is because I’m not sure how this will hold up over the next 24 hours. As it’s cooling, it’s getting quite stiff, and it may just be because when cooking the syrup I went just a