I have a fondant covered cake that needs some scroll work on it. I've heard that it's usually done with RI, however what would the difference be if I used decorating gel?

Also, it's white fondant with black scrolls. Thanks for any advice.

Sorry it has taken so long for anyone to reply to you
I am not exactly what you are calling decorating gel. Do you mean piping gel?
It can be colored black but as with anything else you will have to use soooooooo much color it probably will taste funky ;(
Also not sure what you mean by scroll work. If it's done w/a small round tip - like #2 then yes, you can use piping gel. The difference would be that the gel will be shiny. It will look really nice. I have found when working w/gel to do fine piping you have to use tip #1 or it gets all globby - you can't control it well. Even a paper cone w/just the *very tip* of it cut off would work - just don't cut it too far in. HTH

My only concern with that would be that it would cause the fondant to become tacky. Also it doesn't exactly dry hard or anything. If it gets to hot it would probabyly slip where as RI would hold fast. As least that it what I think. HTH

the piping gel may also bleed, and since it does harden any mistake may be hard to fix.

thanks for your advice. that's what I thought too and just wanted to confirm. I guess the only hesitation is that the piping gel flows so nicely and I have not mastered RI yet. I guess the time is now.

Does piping gel really harden??? I have never had that happen for me so I assumed it didn't. I am so sorry for misinforming you. Wow, now I may have to work with this stuff some more... cool. You learn something new every day.

Why dont you use colored BC. I use that all the time at work on fondant cakes. It works great and it does not get so hard like RI.

I have to admit that I am crappy with piping and I'm not used to holding the bag and getting the same consistency, etc. That's why when I picked up the decorating icing in the tube and put on the tip, I found it great because it was easy to handle and I could control everything better.

Now, I had a tube of icing left and practiced on a small piece of fondant and the icing goes on quite nicely and it's not really shiny. However, about 10 mins later I noticed the icing was drooping every so slightly and the scrolls were not crisp anymore.

So, does anyone recommend a way that I can better control what I'm doing when I use RI in a bag?????