I want to "stain" fondant covering my cake board to look like wood. It's about a 16" circle and most of it will be covered, so it's only the edges around the outside that will show. Any ideas?
Can you just swirl color on?
Should I score it with a rotary tool first?
Thanks.

This wood grain impression mat will look great after the color is painted on.

I have the book "Confetti Cakes" and she shows how to do a stained wood look on fondant. I let a friend borrow the book or I would scan in and post the page.
Sorry couldnt be more help.

I agree with miriel a matt will give you the most detailed look. If you don't want the expense of the mat, I would do this: Use a rolling tool to score lines in the shape of your wood (I'm picturing it like a wood floor, like the first picture in the link miriel sent). Then, mix your brown gel coloring with some vodka or vanilla extract and paint on your details. You want these to be fairly dark. Then, for a stained look, I would use a very light color (does someone make a tan gel color????), maybe even copper or pink. Mix with the vodka or vanilla extract and paint over the whole thing. This might go faster with some kind of sponge. Test your technique on a spare piece of fondant, not your cake board!

I have a pic in my gallery. I used fondant, then gel colors mixed with vodka. I think I used a new/sanitized make-up sponge to streak it on.

I did planks of wood for the cake board on my Tom and Jerry cake (it's in my photos.) I rolled the fondant out and covered the board and then I used a sharp knife to score the wood and make the grain. I then painted it with a diluted brown paste.

Thanks guys!
All your woodgrains look great.
I definitely don't have time to order an impression mat and since I only do 1-2 cakes a year, it's probably not worth it. However, the other suggestions look great!

What are gel colors specially? The kind in the bottles from Americolor?

I don't know how well you can see the grain in this photo, but it is fondant/gumpaste in a 50/50 mixture, rolled and impressed with a woodgrain impression mat, then cut into strips and applied to the cake. Then I painted with a brush with brown paste color thinned with a bit of Everclear and it looked amazingly like real wood. I think you could thin airbrush color with alcohol as well to do the painting.
http://www.cakecentral.com/modules.php?name=gallery&file=displayimage&pid=69140

Wow. That's great. I didnt' even think about doing it in pieces. That makes so much more sense, especially since I really only need to cover the outer part of the circle. Thanks!!

I made a wood grain cake. I used a wood graining tool. It is usually used for painting, but I decided to try it on fondant. I just brushed on color/thinned with vodka and then I used the tool on it. You just drag and rock it and it makes this wonderful grain! There's a pic of it in my photos if you want to see what it looks like. There are 2 pics...a before the tool and after it. Good luck with your cake!

there is a painters tool at walmart that is for faux wood grain. Would that work?

I was just reading about how to make wood grain in my new book Confetti Cakes last night. She uses white and light brown fondant and creates a marble (wood grain) effect. Then she rolls it out flat. Mix 2 TBS vodka and a small drop of brown food coloring. Paint a thin coat over the entire surface. Add more food coloring the the mixture to make a darker brown and paint smaller irregular marking as you would see in real wood. She says to use a piece of wood or cutting board or picture for reference. To make it look more rustic take your paring knife and make rough marking all over the surface of the fondant BEFORE you paint.
Jacqui

Thanks for all the tips. I bought a woodgrain tool at Home Depot which is cool, but it didn't work that great in my scale. Turns out though that the silicone basting brush I was using to apply the color was perfect to drag through the color. Plus, I used the little spikey side of the staining tool. I put too many nailholes on some of the sides, but oh well. LOL.
It was hard to get a picture to show the detail, but you get the idea.
I posted some pics of the poodles in the Cake Decorating forum. They are going to sit on a table which is on the floor.

save