Just wondering the best way to create a "stripe" effect when piping.

In the new Better Homes and Garden Christmas Cookie magazine, there is a recipe for Cocoa Tassies with Peppermint Marshmallow frosting (yum!) The photo had crushed candy cane pieces as garnish, but I was thinking a striped red and white version of the frosting swirled in the cups, looking like a peppermint candy, would be more attractive (and less likely to stick to the teeth!)

Would the "painting the bag" be the best way to go? I'm a little sloppy and when I tried ithe technique in the Wilton 1 class I was displeased with the results. Is there a trick to it? Has anyone seen colored tips available? I also have a plastic icing bag that I bought at a cake supply shop that is "split" (you can but two colors frosting, one on each side of the bag, they join at the tip.) I bought it on a lark, but would it work for this?

Any and all advice welcome!

I guess it would depend on how striped you want it. The half and half bag would be half red, half white of course.
If you did two stripes up the side of a parchment bag it would be more white with more of the striped effect.
You would just have to be really careful when putting the icing in the bag.

I would think that your split bag should work - perhaps try a drop flower tip for the peppermint candy swirl. Using a parchment triangle for your striping bag will probably work better than the plastic disposable kind, or even the plastic Wilton bags. Good luck!

I think if you want a stark color contrast, do the split bag approach. I teach Wilton classes and think I know what you are aiming for. I did a cake this weekend and used the split bag approach to do what I needed and it works fantastic. I was working with black and red. When you use striping, it works well but the stripping may wear out and you may have an uneaven color. If you have the split bag, that works even better than placing two icing colors in one bag.

Good luck!

go to cake decorating forum and do a search for "great tip from my instructor." I think it was newlyweds that gave a great tip for wrapping icing in saran wrap that would would be great for striping.Sounds strange but it does work.

Wow! That was fast! You ladies are great.

Sounds like my dual bag will work with the drop flower tip. If it doesn't, I'll try the saran wrap method. (Heck, I'll use the saran method from now on for everything!)

Thank you, thank you!