Hi
I have been making flowers out of florists paste in various colours, violet has dried nice and hard, but red and brown have not dried at all, if anything they seem softer than when I started, the pink ones haven't dried that well either although they are better than the chocolate coloured ones. Is this becuase I have used a lot of colouring? I used the gel colours by sugar flair, any hints or tips gratefully received!
btw, I store them in a cardboard box on a shaped foam drying mat

Thanks
Ellen

Is it hot or humid where you live? My part of the world is, and I sometimes have this problem. One thing you can do is add a little tylose (CMC) to your fondant. Another thing you can do is to make your flowers from gumpaste (I think it's also called sugar paste), which dries much harder than fondant does.

Did you use a lot of colour to get the red and brown? If you used bought flower paste it should dry out fine but adding a lot of colour will have affected it. How long have they been drying? I'd take them out of the box and put them under a fan. Once they start to dry they should go quick. The box could be holding in the moisture.

Good points about the color and the box, rubycurls. I always buy ready-made red, black and brown fondant just because they need so much color when you make them up yourself. And even then I have to thicken them up somewhat with a little more powdered sugar, but that may just be because of the climate where I live. But I still say you need to use gumpaste over fondant or at least a 50/50 mixture of gumpaste and fondant.

I'm just thinking the op must live in England as we call gumpaste flower paste over here. I'm in the north and it has been horribly humid where I live this past week.

Yes she is not talking about fondant at all, it is gumpaste which is sold as florist paste here.

You haven't said how long you have left them drying for? I think it does depend on humidity, colour and storage conditions.

They should dry eventually but beware of storage once they have dried as I have had gumpaste/florist paste go soft again because of humidity!

HTH

Jx

Thanks for the clarification, ladies! I knew the terms were different, but I have a hard time getting them straight. Oh, well, see my signature line.