Now, if you've been cake decorating for a while you have probably come across these and, if you are like us, probably have a cupboard full of every colour available.
However, if you've only just started cake decorating you may not have seen these as they are not available in the supermarkets.
Most of us grew up using the liquid colours - remember when you would dye your icing so dark that when you took a bite you ended up with a coloured moustache? Well liquid colours certainly have their place but once you've discovered the colour pastes then there's no looking back.
When you use liquid colours you will find that not only do you have to use quite a lot they will also alter the consistency of your icing. The colours they produce are not very vibrant and the range of colours is also very limited.
Colour pastes are concentrated colour and although the pot they come in seems quite small you only use such a small amount that if you are only baking at home you will find that the pots last for months, if not years.
We tend to use the Wilton Colour pastes on our courses but there are other brands available.
Here's how you use them;
To use these paste colour simply dip a cocktail stick into the paste and then add to your icing. Mix your icing together and then repeat (using a clean cocktail stick each time) until you have the shade you desire (you will not need very much colour as they are very strong)
These paste colours are great for colouring all icing including glace, buttercream and sugarpaste (fondant/rolled out icing)
To colour sugarpaste (fondant/rolled out icing) simply dip the cocktail stick into the colour paste, as before, and then stick that into the sugarpaste. Then just need the icing together. You will probably find that it will have a marble effect to start with but keep going and the colour will work it's way through.
A top tip when colouring sugarpaste though is to make sure that you don't have any other colours on your hands before you start kneading the icing. If you are colouring up a mix of colours then start with the palest colour first and then move on to the darker colours.
You can also mix the colour pastes together to make a different colour. For example if you mix Kelly Green and Sky Blue together you will end up with a beautiful turquoise!!
In this picture we have used sky blue, lemon yellow and rose pink
Happy Colouring!!
No comments:
Post a Comment