When you make pearls out of fondant do you make them one at a time by hand or do you use a bead maker.. I was looking at a few sites and found silicone bead makers and was wondering if they work well?
Liz

I've only made them one at a time--haven't tried a bead maker. I used Earlene Moore's instructions on her website. www.earlenescakes.com

I'd be interested to know if the bead makers work well, though.

I used Earlene's directions also. They were time consuming but very easy, and looked great on my 1st wedding cake.
kat

I have the fondant bead maker,the beads come out in a strand if you want singles you have to cut apart and roll them. Hopes this helps
Theresa

If you're using the bead maker, it comes with two possible methods, one is to spray it with cooking spray, then coat with luster dust after the beads come out. The second is to actually put luster dust in the bead maker. I have had no luck with the second method, and have wasted quite a bit of luster dust trying! The beadmaker does work really well if you want a strand of uniformly-sized beads though!

Thanks everyone for the tips. I made some just by hand and they weren't all exactly the same size but they did look nice.. I need to get some pearl dust to make them look like pearls and not just tiny balls..LOL
Liz

I've tried both methods and honestly have had no luck with the silicone bead maker. Much easier to do them by hand in my opinion. Good thing to do when watching a movie, football game or whatever....can kind of kick the "brain into neutral" and before you know it....you have a ton of pearls!