I am making a Mardi Gras cake and have made several strings of "beads" with gumpaste. Now that it's dry I want to give it a shiney finish. How do I do that?
thank you

You can steam them or paint a little bit of edible varnish on them. The edible varnish is usually used for making certain types of leaves shiny. It can be ordered through cake supply stores.

Michele

How do I steam the gumpaste necklace to get it shiney?

If you have a tea kettle, get the water to a full boil and pass the beads through the steam very briefly. This can be done over a pot of boiling water, but the steam is hard to see and it's very easy to burn yourself or melt your work. A clothing steamer works well too.

After steaming place the necklace some place to dry so that it does not touch anything. The beads will be sticky for about an hour.

This technique is great for making flowers look less dusty and to set the colors.

Michele

Thanks so much, I do have a hand steamer for cleaning and I'll try that.
I'm a newby so I appreciate the help.

You can use Pam. I saw a cake decorator did it and it was perfect. the butter flavor Pam.

You could also use a little bit of luster dust or peal dust in a complementary color

No not at all. It was perfect and had a beautiful satiny finish. If droplets occur just smooth it with a brush, she even said cotton balls would work fine too.

Vodka/piping gel mixture works great for that. I've also used corn syrup/vodka mixture. Both of them dry nicely. Vodka's also great with cranberry juice and....

Thank you to everyone for the great ideas for a shiney finish. I will try all of them and report back on my findings. the Mardi Gras cake is very colorful and festive looking so I just wanted to give it that extra shine to make it even better. Thanks for your help. This is the first question I have posted and I sincerely appreciate all the feedback. grammatlc