How to Make an Orange Icing Glaze for your cakes, sweetbreads, cupcakes, and more! It’s so simple and easy – and orange is SO underloved when it comes to baking! Well, not anymore! This orange icing glaze will be amazing on a ton of baked goods, mix and match the flavors!
This goes beautifully with my delicious Orange Cake (which you can see pictured above) so be sure to give it a try, it’s delicious!
Everyone loves a good orange icing glaze.
We need to stop ignoring oranges for lemons, right about now. I get it, I really do because I adore everything lemon as well and admittedly lemon is my favourite out of the two. Oranges however are a much ignored fruit when it comes to making sweet breads, loaves and icings and they shouldn’t be. Oranges are cheaper, more plentiful and the colour is simply spectacular. If you feast with your eyes first as they say then oranges win over lemon for me every time. This has become a new favourite in the house ever since I made it!
How can I pick the most flavourful oranges to use?
Navel oranges can be hard, juice-less and downright nasty in the middle of winter. I have good luck usually with Sunkist when I can find them, it seems that there is a better quality to them when they have that label.
Cara Cara oranges are also a good bet for juice and flavor, they are slightly pink inside as well. When it comes down to picking a good orange to use, try to detect which ones are really thick-skinned and avoid them at all costs- those are always terrible inside. If you can, try to find Florida-grown oranges, those are usually the best but when everything is off-season you’re going to have to look extra hard for good oranges. Here’s a really interesting article about oranges with some great information.
Orange Icing Glaze Tips & Tricks
- Pick the freshest, best oranges that you can find.
- Look for oranges that have healthy peel on the outside, remember that you are going to zest the peel so look for skin that is unblemished.
- Smell the oranges when you are picking them. Sometimes you can get a really good sense of the orange inside when it smells very fragrant. That also means that the oils in the peel are strong, which means you will get a strong flavour when you zest it.
If you are looking for another delicious icing glaze recipe, try my Lemon Icing Glaze Recipe. It’s one of the most popular on my website!
Happy baking everyone!
Love,
Karlynn
How to Make Orange Icing Glaze
Ingredients
- 1 3/4 cups confectioners sugar
- 1/4 cup orange juice
- 1 tablespoon orange zest
- 1 teaspoon salted butter melted
Instructions
- In a large Pyrex measuring cup (the 4 cup capacity ones are the best to use for this) combine the sugar, orange juice and orange zest. Whisk until there are no lumps.
- Add in the butter then whisk together again until smooth. If it is not pourable, you can microwave it for 30 seconds or so.
- Let the mixture sit if you microwaved it, otherwise you can pour it over your cake or loaf.
Notes
Nutrition
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Donna arbaugh says
Question. What does the butter do to the icing? What’s it purpose?
Karlynn J says
The butter gives it that nice crackle texture when the icing hardens a bit!
Steven says
Heaven in a spoon.
Donna Fleming says
Thank you so much for making a cake without cream cheese. I have noticed that almost every cake these days is frosted with cream cheese and I am sure that I am in the minority, but I hate the taste of cream cheese. Prior to the 1970s, cream cheese was not popular. I was raised in the 1960s, so I didn’t aquire the taste. I have made several of your recipes and they are wonderful!!
Barbara says
Easy to make and delicious too!
Sara says
I drizzled it on an angel food cake and took it to church. Everybody loved it. I will make it again. Thank you so much for the recipe.
Christy says
I had these very sour cuties left over so I used my little blender and took the rest I hadn’t used in an orange loaf and put them in the blender (after they were peeled) along with your recipe and man is it good! I used the puree button and blended those little sour cuties into the best icing you ever put in your mouth. Waste not want not! Thanks for the recipe!
Mimi says
Just finished baking zucchini bread, do I need to completely cool before putting this beautiful glaze on??
Thank you!
Sharon says
Can I use normal sugar for this?
Becky says
I didn’t have cream cheese, so opted for this orange glaze recipe – made it with blood orange zest/juice and it was not only was it easy and delicious, but pretty!
Marie says
I made this orange glaze for an orange Bundt cake. The glaze was so orangey, easy and delicious. It was a hit and I’ll make it again. It was the best part of the cake. I used large Florida tangerines which are local and in season.
Deborah Fleming says
This was amazing! Ate the whole thing ..can wait to make again !! Thank u for sharing
David Watson says
sheeeeeeeeesh
quite excellent, thanks for sharing
Julie says
Thank you for the great recipe. This loaf cake was delicious, I added raspberries. The whole family devoured it. I hope God blesses you and your family.
Christine L Bacheller says
This is a wonderful orange glaze .. thank you so much and I pray the Lord blesses you all too🥰
Patty says
Thank you. It was excellent.
Just another tip about picking oranges. If it is heavy then it is probably full of juice. A light weight orange will usually be dry and tasteless.
Pamela says
Made this glaze to put on my cranberry orange loaf. DELICIOUS!!
Thank you for donating to families. You are a blessing to people in need!!!
Karlynn Johnston says
I am so glad you liked the glaze! And it’s thank to readers like you that give us the opportunity to give back to our community through the food bank! Without you readers, we wouldn’t be able to give back, so THANK YOU for visiting the site!
Chela says
Absolutely delicious! It’s simple and an all time winner.
Finn says
It was way to sweet and I’m a sugarhollic. I am also 9 years old
Donna Jakobsen says
This site has an incredible amount of advertising!! So many pop up ads as well as many ads between the recipe instructions. Takes forever to find the recipe ?
Karlynn Johnston says
Hi Donna,
You bet I have ads, and those ads are feeding two families a month through the Edmonton Food Bank! If you look right above the recipe I have a link to the food bank and tell everyone that thanks to ads on this website, we are helping to feed two large families of 5-7 people each month. I think that it’s worth the little bother of ads to help out where we can. I COULD take off some ads, but then I wouldn’t be able to donate as much money monthly. Most people love the idea that they are helping out others by simply viewing ads on my website.
Therror says
Just looking for an orange loaf recipe and this caught my eye: “I’m allergic to broccoli. I’ve never met a cocktail that I didn’t like. I would rather burn down my house than clean it.”
“what the hell”, said I, we must be lost sisters !
Making this tonight.
April says
I used this on an orange chiffon cake (would love to have been able to add a photo) and it turned out great. Thanks!
sonny boyes says
brilliant although you should add to the recipe that you should add a drop of water to get the right thickness.
prudy says
Wow! Amazing!
Kada Morris says
This glaze is awesome. Thanks!