How to make your own metallic food coloring

August 28, 2020

Categories: Isomalt courses - Isomalt lollipops - Techniques - Working with Isomalt

CCreating metallic effects in our decorations is wonderful, especially for those of us who are passionate about metal. There are many brands where you can buy metallic dye, but to be honest, aside from red and green for Christmas, we don’t usually use the other colors that much. Well, I do, haha. What happens when we’re making a decoration—and I’m not just talking about candy—and we want to add a metallic touch, but we don’t have that specific color we’re craving? Keep reading, I’ll tell you the solution.

My favorite trick for getting any metallic color

This tip is one I’ve always used. But after seeing how my students react when I talk about it in online and in-person isomalt sugar courses, I’ve realized it’s not such a common trick.

I’m a geek for metallic food colors

I’m not going to lie. I love them. And although I use them a lot to add color to candy, it’s an effect you can use with any decoration. I’m sure there are many times when you want to add a metallic touch to the pink you’re going to use on a cake, or the purple you’re going to paint a flower with, and you don’t have that metallic tone that will elevate your creation to another level.

From now on you can make them at home without having to buy them

How? All you need to do is mix your food coloring with either gold or silver.

Let me explain a little more

First of all, you need to have at home:

Food coloring in the shade you want to achieve.
Gold or silver coloring, as appropriate, read on to learn how to mix one or the other.

The color chart

The pattern for mixing these colors to achieve an excellent metallic finish is as follows:

Cool colors, which are those in the blue, green and violet range, are mixed with silver food coloring.
The warm colors, which are those in the fuchsia, red, orange and yellow range, are mixed with gold food coloring.

Here’s a color wheel to give you an idea of what the cool and warm colors are.

What foods can I color with a metallic tone?

Caramel or isomalt

I want to emphasize that caramel or isomalt are the only raw materials that, when dyed with metallic color, become metallic.

Can I metallicize chocolate, modeling paste, or fondant?

Unlike caramel, chocolate, modeling paste, or fondant, you need to paint them after the piece is finished. If you want to learn more about how to color caramel, I explain it in more detail in the post on how to color isomalt sugar. And that’s it! It’s that easy to give a metallic effect to any coloring.

Are you interested in the world of isomalt sugar? Then these tips will surely be useful: Learn how to store isomalt. Did I cook the isomalt correctly?