Hey Bestie! Being in the thick of the holiday baking season, I’m tackling one of my most frequently asked questions! How do you create stunning, vivid royal icing colors? Many cookiers are spending hours and even days trying to create the beautiful, rich colors they want. Stop the madness…who’s got time for that?! I make all my colors in a matter of minutes for perfect results. So let’s bust the myths and misconceptions once and for all and focus on exactly how to create the royal icing colors you want, easily. If you’ve been here before, you know that’s what I’m all about. The simple, quick and effective methods, tricks and recipes so you can create beautiful baked goods and enjoy more of your time! Let’s go!
Your Royal Icing Recipe Matters
When cookiers see beautiful icing, they are quick to ask, “What kind of coloring do you use”? But here’s the deal bestie, the meringue powder you use in your royal icing is just as, if not even more, important than the coloring you’re using. You can use the best brands of coloring, but if you’re not using good quality meringue powder, you’re going to need to use more coloring and may not even be able to achieve the colors you want.
Not all meringue powder is created equal, and actually offer very different results in flavor, structure, sheen, color saturation and more. These are variables I’ve researched and tested over the years to find the best products that give you the best results at the best price. You can see how Wilton and Genie’s Dream meringue powders stacked up against each other in this meringue powder showdown. And then you’ll find how Genie’s Dream, Chefmaster and Judee’s stacked up against each other in round two HERE.
The bottom line is that if you use good quality meringue powder, you will be able to use a lot less coloring and be able to achieve the colors you want much easier. Choosing to save money on cheap meringue powder is not only going to not give you the colors you want but also cost you more in coloring. So while the coloring you use is important, it’s only one part of the equation in creating beautiful royal icing colors.
I highly encourage cookiers to try different meringue powders to find what offers them the best results across all the areas that are important to them. I personally only use Genie’s Dream and Judee’s for my royal icing. But the takeaway here is that the meringue powder you use makes a world of difference in creating beautiful royal icing colors. And if you need a fabulous royal icing recipe, you’ll find how I make my icing every day, HERE.
Let’s talk coloring
The coloring you use matters too! When it comes to royal icing, you only want to use water-based or powder coloring, don’t use any oil-based coloring in royal icing. Oil will break down the structure of royal icing, affecting how it dries and commonly impeding drying altogether. So reserve your oil-based colors for chocolate.
There are a variety of fabulous coloring brands that offer deeply pigmented products to achieve stunning royal icing colors. I personally use Hobby Lobby and Chefmaster coloring for beautiful results at a great price point. Both of these are liquid-gel drops, which also make it easier for me to recreate consistent colors and results.
Americolor is another very popular brand, which is more of a paste-like coloring. The Sugar Art is also a popular brand for those who like their powdered coloring and gel colors. These are all brands I recommend for achieving beautiful royal icing colors. It’s really cookier preference on which type of coloring you like to work with best. The takeaway with coloring is to use a quality brand. Cheaper coloring is simply not going to give you the results you want, and you’ll have to use much more of it, negating any potential savings anyway.
Interested in all-natural food coloring? Many families and bakers are moving in this direction and that will only be gaining more popularity. You can see the all-natural coloring I use as well as other considerations for using dye-free coloring HERE.
But how do I make my colors?
Alright Bestie, I’m a bit of a rebel on this, but it works for me and thousands of other cookiers as well. What many have been conditioned to believe is that they need to make their colors very slow, letting them develop over many hours or days. The fear is oversaturation, adding too much color that it affects or impedes how your icing dries. But here’s the deal, you have to use a lot of coloring to oversaturate icing. As long as you stop adding coloring when you’re a shade or two away from the color you want, there is no need to worry about oversaturating, or spend hours or days making your colors. Just know that your colors will continue to develop, so stop adding color before you’re at the color you want.
I literally make my colors in under 1 minute and get decorating. I simply don’t have hours or days to let me colors to develop and there’s no need. Now if you want to see exactly what your final color will be before you start decorating, then yes, you can take that time to let it develop over hours or days. I can’t think of a time that nailing an exact hue was so important to me that I was willing to wait days to see it before I started decorating, but that’s just me!
is white coloring necessary?
I may ruffle some feathers here, but I wouldn’t be your Bestie if I didn’t give it to you straight. Adding white coloring to your royal icing, believing it helps avoid color bleed, is another fallacy. White coloring is not necessary in your royal icing unless you’re just using it to whiten your icing. It does not prevent color bleed and actually makes it much harder to create vivid colors and can lead to oversaturating your icing. White coloring is still coloring, so if you’re adding white coloring in addition to other colors, you’re going to get to oversaturated icing that much faster.
Preventing color bleed comes from how your icing is made. When royal icing has the proper structure and meringue powder to powdered sugar ratios, color bleed won’t occur. The most common reasons cookiers experience color bleed is from undermixed icing (lack of structure), oversaturated icing (too much color) and high humidity environments that extend royal icing being able to dry.
I don’t even own white coloring, have never had a need for it and have never experienced color bleed. I highly encourage you to skip the white coloring in your icing and focus more on your icing’s structure, ingredients, how you’re coloring you’re icing and how you’re drying your icing. Test it for yourself and your icing!
Let’s make some royal icing colors
Alright if a picture is worth a thousand words, a video has got to be worth like a million, right? I created this quick video to show you exactly how easily I make my colors. I hope you find this helpful and like I always suggest, test it for yourself! You may very well find you’ve been unnecessarily wasting time and that there’s a much more efficient way! You can find the video HERE or by clicking on the piping bag image below.
ready to create your own colors?
I sure hope this was helpful for you in achieving the stunning, vivid royal icing colors you want! And if you have any questions, need more help or want to share your experience, you can share in our Bestie community HERE! Thousands of Besties, me included, hang out there to help, support and celebrate each other and our bakes!
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