I want to do a gymnasium floor as part of my cake and achieve that shiny look. Do you think I should use edible varnish? Or would that be too glassy? Would I be better off with crisco? Or any other ideas? TIA

If you go to my photos, and look at the fondant "wood" floor under the ballerina cake, it was glazed with confectioner's glaze. I thought it looked just right for a varnished wood floor.

HTH,
Deanna

My understanding is that confectioners glaze is not edible. Try spraying it with a light coating of cooking spray.

Confectioner's glaze is edible. It's what gives gumballs and Junior Mints (to name a few) their shine. But if it's being used as a cake board covering, like on my ballerina, it's not going to be an issue. If this is, for example, the top of a cake that is decorated to look like a gym floor, I might not use it because it will give a strange texture to the fondant to chew it. Now that I re-read the original post, I think that's what's being said.

Deanna

I didn't know that Deanna - thanks for the info

No problem.

Deanna

What about piping gel? I have actually used a little tylose in water and painted with it to give a shiny finish - it worked great and is edible. I haven't tried confectioner's glaze - what is it?

Piping gel tends to be a little sticky, in my experience, but it would work fine.

Confectioner's glaze is a food-grade shellac, basically. It's used in pharmaceuticals to coat pills and to give a shine to candies. It comes in a bottle and can be applied with a brush. It can be hard to clean up, though. To make my own life easier, I pour a little into a bathroom-sized Dixie cup and use disposable brushes and then throw everything away, rather than clean up cups and brushes.

HTH,
Deanna

It tastes terrible if you don't dilute it. If you dilute it, you won't get the hi power shine.

It is used on gumballs and candies, but it's very diluted and they pan it to get the shine.

It's true that factories pan their candies, but home users don't usually have panning machines. A panner is on my list of when-I'm-rich purchases. We had one in the chocolate shop I worked in when I lived in TX, and that thing is great.

You can dilute the glaze, but like atcake says, it's not very shiny if you do. That sort of ties in with my post above when I said I'd use it on a covered cake board but not so much if it's on the actual cake. Use the glaze on your board, but use something else on your cake itself.

Deanna

In the end, I just used crisco and I thought it worked quite well. Where can I get confectioner's glaze??

You can order it online, or my local cake shop (local is in 'before I moved away') carries it. If you've got a cake shop nearby, if they don't already carry it, they can get it for you. GSA probably has it, but I haven't looked since I could get it locally.

I just saw that cake in your photos. It looks great!