Fondant

from my experience . . . my fondant has gotten sticky on me as well when I’m trying to get a dark color. I think it’s normal, especially if you’re using a gel color. Between adding the color (which adds moisture) and using your hands to work the color in (your hands are warm, therefore your adding additional heat). Added to all that, if there’s heat or humidity in your climate, you’re going to get a sticky fondant. I tend to rub some shortening on my hands (or gloves, which I now wear to keep my hands from getting overly saturated in color). That seems to keep the fondant from sticking to my hands. When trying to achieve a really dark color (like a navy blue) I tend to work in stages to allow the fondant to rest.

thank you, i’ll try the shortening next time

I also use shortening when working with fondant.. whether it be kneading in color or rolling it out for cakes/sculpting/etc. I always use shortening!

Hi Neddo!
(I´m Lebanese too!) In warm weathers such as Lebanon or Spain where I live, the best is to use the Carma Ticino, it´s a fondant specially created for ho, humid and tropical climates. My life has changed since I discovered it!!!
It is made by the company Callebaut, just google " Carma massa Ticino! and it will lead you to their page, they are sold world wide. I am sure you will find it in Lebanon, it´s a cake decorator from Dubai who gave me the name and she gets it there.

If you’re trying to get a really dark colour – red, black, blue etc than it does get really sticky. I use gloves to stop my hands staining, and it is always best to colour a few days before you need the fondant. This gives it time to rest and it also develops a darker colour. If you colour it and then try to cover a cake straight away the fondant will be really soft and hard to work with.

Hi Miriam! thanks for your advice, but it was just i light blue, but i kept adding blue until i reached my color, so i had to work a lot the fondant in my hand, thanks again:)
Cake Couture! Happy to hear you’re Lebanese,, too bad, we don’t have that brand in Lebanon, but we do have Callebaut chocolate in here, I’ll try to Google it, thanks for your advice:)

One of the sugarcraft teachers that I interviewed for one of my programmes – said that she would never recommend trying to add a colour into white fondant – in order to try to achieve a very dark colour. The amount of gel colour you need to add, and the effort involved, and the ultimate depth of colour achieved, resulted in paying more in gel, time and inferior outcome. She said that it was much better to simply purchase an off the shelf deep colour which is already the correct colour and ready to use. It made sense to me – when I thought back to all the times of scrubbing my hands to try and remove the colour embedded in them (and when I started novelty cake making – there was a very limited choice of coloured fondant icing, so you had to colour it yourself.)

I think Neddo must have the same problem I encounter in Spain: there is no colored fondant to buy at all :-(((

Here is how I solved this problem and get any dark colors I want with no mess:
I mix a little quantity of gel with s powdered color (food coloring, not dusts) Any hydro soluble one will do, not the oily ones for chocolate!
I do the mixing directly on the fondant with a spoon. The gel will help the powder to dissolve. I knead once, then wrap it and allow the powder to flourish overnight.
I then give it a good last knead the next day et voila! Perfect reds, blacks, navy, dark greens.
The lack of goods makes us creative ;-)

thank you so much for your answers:)