Looking at the recent thread on intense reds, with or without intense, unpleasant flavors, I abruptly remembered that I'm interested in something brown (but NOT chocolate) to give the hand-piped lettering on next year's Leland Award cake a little better contrast with the beige of the maple-cinnamon base frosting.

 

Dumping cinnamon and ground cloves into it with reckless abandon (and equally reckless disregard for possible unpleasant side effects) doesn't darken it nearly enough, and the McCormick liquid food colorings don't seem to give me a brown so much as they give it odd color casts.

 

And of course, I'm looking for something that's not likely to have any unpleasant side effects.

ATry Wilton's brown. You could probably find it at Wal-Mart or your local craft store. It's a gel paste so it's concentrated.

A

Hmm. I should think that coffee would fight with a spice cake just as much as chocolate would.

As to this year's Leland cake, well, here's what I did http://cakecentral.com/t/765362/guide-for-lettering#post_7459645

and here's how it turned out http://cakecentral.com/t/765362/guide-for-lettering/15#post_7460521

I think next year, I'll try piping ridges (maybe even in slightly darker frosting) for "the family pattern," rather than plowing furrows, since the pattern didn't show up very well.

Hi, we use Sugarflair gel concentrated color. For us is the best choice.

The lettering turned out great!

Yes the writing is better, and the movement of the logos will give you more writing room.

Just go out and buy some brown gel food coloring. Ben Franklin would want you to use proper coloring in your printing.