I tried making black royal icing last night but it ended up being this yucky greenish/grayish/brownish color instead. The consistency was like Fluff, it was so terrible. I ended up throwing the whole batch it the trash bin. 
I was using wilton gel colors (probably not the best idea). I started with a bit of brown, then blue, then green, and finally black lol. I guess it was my own fault...
Can you all please provide me with some tips for making pure black royal icing for piping. What brand color do you use? Should I use liquid or gel? Or perhaps powder. As you can all see, I really need help. I plan to use it with the grass tip to pipe hair on a sculpted character that I'm making.
I use Toba Garret's Meringue Powder Royal Icing recipe, btw. Thanks!
It will darken as it dries - I add americolor to a charcoal gray color - then it will turn black when dry. HTH!
I also use antonia74's recipe. I had some brown RI leftover from a little while back and the other night I needed black. I used the Americolor black and it did not take much at all. Maybe like 5 drops. Highly recommend the Americolor black.
Pickulz- Why can't you have americolor shipped????
I live in the middle east -shipping charges are usually a lot and not many companies ship here. I just moved here after living in the US/Canada for over 10 years and I soooo miss going to 'Michaels, Hobby Lobby, AC Moore'!
There are very limited cake decorating supply shops here and they typically carry only Wilton. Though one of my friends is going to visit in November and I going to have her bring it.
Unfortunatley I need black icing and a good red icing for this saturday! Its my sons 5th birthday party and im making a spiderman cake...or attempting to.
I just made white spider webs out of RI and they are drying! Wish I made them black though.
Now Im wondering how to get a good red colour from the Wilton no taste red I have!
I had the same problem recently too. I finally got black but by that time my icing was super runny. I was told to use powder colors or start out with just the gel color and no water. Once it was the right color, add water until the consistency was right.
I haven't had a chance to try again yet.
Good luck!
Why didn't you start with just black? I've covered cake boards in black royal icing, using Wilton's and it does get darker as it sits.
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