In the past when I have made fondant figures I have colored little pieces of fondant first and then the figures. But, for the next cake I'm working on I'm thinking of making the figures out of white fondant and then painting them. Which way works the best and is the easiest?

Also, does anyone know how to get a rust red color?

I was wondering the same thing. Do you use mmf on your figures?

I have, but this time I'm going to try to use Toba Garrett's recipe for fondant. I've never made it before. I need the figures for a cake I'm doing for Saturday. I hope I can get them to dry in time. If all else fails I will be doing a FBCT.

Toristreats,

Off the subjuect my birthday is September 15th!

Danifani, still off the subject, my thrid baby is due Sept. 15.

So, since you are the only to have replied to this thread...have you ever made fondant figures before?

I tried to make a mmf cheshire cat to go on a topsy turvy cake, it was pretty funny. Needless to say I used a ceramic one instead!

I'm making sesame street figures for my daughter's bday cake now. So far I have 3 done - big bird, elmo and bert. next on the list - zoe, cookie monster and possibly oscar. What I have noticed with using the fondant for figurines is that they tend to sag as they dry. Poor Elmo looks like he aged quite a number of years within an hour or so of being 'created'. I started making these before I received a response to a post I made where I learned adding some gum-tex (or tylose) to the fondant will make them stronger/dry faster. I'm going to make the European fondant this evening with gum-tex (first time ever making my own fondant) and see how it works for the remaining figurines.

Once the figurines are dry I imagine painting with food coloring would be easy to do - and really cool! I've done a few things with the Wilton pens on my current figurines and they turned out nice - I bet the pens just contain food coloring.

Thanks. I guess I'm going to try doing them in all white and painting the figures. We will see how it turns out.

I'm an idiot. My plan last night was to make a batch of the European fondant with a bit of gum-tex, right? Well, had the gum-tex on the counter with all the other ingredients that I used and what did I not do??? Add the silly gum-tex! My brain was obviously not operating at full capacity.

So, looks like i'll have more saggy figurines

You can knead the Gum-Tex into the fondant and it will work just as good.

really? that's great news! any suggestion on how much powder to add to a single batch of the european fondant?

I'm not sure but I think a teaspoon will do. We did this in my Wilton Course 3 class and I think the instructor used 1/4 tsp for 8 oz and whole batch would be quite a bit more than that. Maybe someone with experience with this will answer.