I saw a few posts asking how to make gold and silver for piping.....found this recipe and thought I would share it:

2 ts. Powdered sugar
2 ts. gold silver or metallic dusting powder
clear alcohol
1 ts. piping gel

On a small ceramic plae, mix sugar and dusting powder. Add a few drops of clear alcohol (gin or vodka is suggested) and mix with a small palette knife to create a stiff paste

Add the piping gel, a little at a time, mixing well until the consistency for piing in reached. Use a very small piping bag and tip as needed. The leftovers can be put into a small container and stored in the refrigerator. It will keep indefinitely

What a priceless tip; thanks so much for sharing it!

Thanks MrsMissey...........that was nice of you!!!!...i just love this site!! I am becoming addicted to it!! Donna

You're welcome! It seems to be a topic that comes up quite often and I've never really seen a recipe posted!

..and yes, this site is very addictive!!

Please clarify is that gold or silver dust, luster dust? And is the clear alcohol like lemon extract or gin or vodka.
Just wondering!

..yes..gold and silver are luster dust colors! Not sure what you are asking about the clear alcohol...?

Is luster dust and shimmer dust the same?

No, luster dust and shimmer dust are different. I found out the hard way. I kept trying to paint with the shimmer dust, though you get a little something, it is definately not luster dust. Luster dust gives a rich shiny gold or silver or whatever color. Thanks for the recipe. I was wondering about that...

No, they are indeed different. Luster dusts are pearl-like in appearance while shimmer dusts catch light differently and do just that, shimmer. Kinda like lip-gloss young girls like to wear....

Thanks for the tip MrsMissey!! I can always use a good tip for LD.

Tanya

Thanks soooo much...I can't wait to try this out.....up until now I have been piping first and spent LOTS of time carefully painting each dot afterwards. BTW....will this harden like Royal or do you think we can add a little cream or tartar to make it harden? Thanks a million!

..based on the ingredients, it is not likely to harden. If you try the cream of tartar, let us know how it goes!

damn, I wish I'd have known about this just the other day. Silver piping would have been great for the anniversary cake I did! (the newest one in my pictures)Lavender and silver were the colors that she was decorating with. I used silver for the cake board and lavender for cake decorations but silver would have been really cool.

such is life. Next time

Thanks alot for this tip. I'll be excited to try it out!

Thank you for this nice tip! Definately will be trying it soon! Jen

This is awesome ! thanks! I'm doing a 50th anniverary cake soon and was wondering how i was going to pipe the gold scrolls

It just so happens I'm doing a cake with gold scrolls today. I'll give this a shot and report back. It might not be until later.

Thanks Crimsicle...I can't wait to hear your opinion on how this turns out.
Ps Where in TN?

Thanks for the tip! I am so excited to try it out!

Well...I can already report back.

I was encouraged when I mixed the powdered sugar, luster dust and alcohol. But, when I stirred in the piping gel, it caused the mixture to seize, somewhat like chocolate does when you use regular colors in it. So, I figured what the heck...it's useless anyway...so I stirred in a second teaspoon of gel. That turned it back into something pipable...but it is NOT a shiny gold. It is a nice, bright gold COLOR. I will still have to go over the scrolls with liquified luster dust.

Actually, all is not lost. I was going to put some luster dust into my piping gel, anyway - to hopefully make the piping be more defined against the fondant. So, I'm really about where I wanted to be. I would not have put powdered sugar in it on my own, however. I think that helps to opaque it and gets me even closer to what I wanted. So, I'm glad I tried this.

But, no...this recipe does NOT give you nice, shiny gold piping gel. The stuff needs the unimpeded reaction with light to look metallic. Kinda what I figured, but it was worth a shot.

KJT - I'm in a Memphis suburb.

Hmm..thats good to know sooo how did the decorator of this cake
(sorry i don't know who..but i think this cake is from a CC'er)
Get their scrolls to look like this?

that to me looks like it was piped with royal icing and then painted with gold lustre dust/alcohol mixture...

Is there an easier way?

Well, I just finished the cake. Pictures tomorrow, but be kind. It's my first scroll work. Anyway....the "recipe" was a disaster from the get-go. As I stated above, I had to add twice the piping gel to make it pipable at all, because the first teaspoon caused a clay-like seizure in the bowl. The second teaspoon looked fine. But, when I piped it on the cake, it ran and dripped. Yuk! So, I scraped that off and went back to Plan A, which was to add luster dust to straight piping gel. I did add some powdered sugar, which was not part of my original plan. That worked pretty well...other than my own general ineptitude with piping scrolls. I'm going to let the scrolls dry a little overnight. I'm hoping for a bit of a "skin" on them. I'll brush them with thin luster dust and alcohol before taking the cake in.

It was an interesting exercise. The alcohol was apparently the wrong substance. It caused te gel to seize...and then in the end it ended up making the stuff too runny. It behaved really strangely. When I left the alcohol out, it behaved just fine.

But, bottom line is...all this gives you is a nice gold COLOR which conveniently matches your luster dust. Not a metallic gold.

Hey, that's my cake! I did it with royal icing and painted gold luster dust mixed with rum onto the dried royal.

After going back and reading this thread, I just thought that I'd throw something out there. I have tried several times to get a good piping silver/gold and have yet to succeed. Like the above poster said, you get a nice gold or silver color, but not the sheen that I want. Either the color or consistancy is wrong in every attempt I've made so far. So, I just do the royal painted thing.... If I ever figure this stuff out, I'll definatly share, maybe even bottle it up and sell it!

Thanks for the help on how you did the scrolls. Your cake is awesome DianaMarieMTV
I hope you don't mind that i'm using your scroll as inspiration!

Wow these are some great instructions for piping silver and gold luster dust

just an fyi....i think crimsicle posted about a SHINY gold piping gel look, michaels now carries shiny piping gel! its about four dollars for a decent sized tube, they've got it in blue, red, gold and i think silver. it looks like glitter glue for grafts, but its edible piping gel. so...in case anyone wants something of that nature, you know where to find it easily without the experimention !

i think it is by wilton.