Is it possible to homebrew edible silkscreen ink?

March 23, 2007 3:14 PM

Is it possible to create edible ink for an edible silkscreen?

AskMefi!: My local library is running an Edible Book Festival and my girlfriend and I are out to destroy the competition. Maybe that's not quite in keeping with the spirit of comradarie the festival seeks to create, but, hey.

So, anyhow, as a way to get ahead we're thinking about silkscreening our fondant to get some text on the "page". Problem being that most convential inks aren't edible. Is it possible to home brew an edible silkscreen ink? I found one cooking supply place that sells edible inks, but they're both expensive and way in excess of what we'd need. Is it possible to just use diluted food color? Or a simple syrup?

Home cooks! Graphic nerds! Bestow upon us your knowledge and make us the King and Queen of EBF '07!

posted by GilloD to food & drink (11 comments total)

This wouldn't be silkscreening, but these pens aren't that expensive.
posted by needs more cowbell at 3:39 PM on March 23, 2007

You can put photos on cake, I think it could work for your book.
icingimages.com to get you started. I have seen quite a few grocery store bakeries that can do this, maybe they'll print up a page for you.
posted by idiotfactory at 3:41 PM on March 23, 2007

It may be possible to suck the ink out and reapply it as I see fit. Thanks! I was also reading about a chef who used a miso-squid ink paste to silk screen, so it may not be as hard as I thought.

To reapply: Silkscreeners: Do I need a certain viscosity? Do some substances not adhere or not appear vibrantly?
posted by GilloD at 3:42 PM on March 23, 2007

I think you need a certain viscosity to be able to squeegee the ink across the screen. Maybe chocolate syrup would work?
posted by benign at 3:46 PM on March 23, 2007

A red cabbage-based gel, perhaps? Or maybe even just gel food coloring.
posted by jferg at 3:57 PM on March 23, 2007

This doesn't really help with the ink question, but this Wafer Paper would be very useful. Instead of printing directly onto the Fondont, you can print/write on this paper and then transfer it to the cake.
posted by saffry at 4:36 PM on March 23, 2007

Tomato paste with food coloring. It's about the same consistency as normal ink and it works great, in addition to being edible.
posted by bradbane at 5:29 PM on March 23, 2007

I'm pretty sure I saw someone on Food Network screenprinting with melted chocolate. I believe it was on one of those Food Network challenge shows. I think that it would have to be a little thicker than chocolate syrup, but that's just based on my observation of the inks in our screen printing department at work. Full disclosure: I've supervised screen printing but never actually done it myself.
posted by bristolcat at 7:24 PM on March 23, 2007

You can ink-jet-print on rice paper with edible inks, but you must either be able to clean your printer very well beforehand or have a printer dedicated to printing only edibles. Regular ink-jet ink is poisonous.

Edible frosting sheets The sheet is not actually frosting; the site says that it will dissolve into the frosting of your cake.
Edible inks
posted by bad grammar at 8:25 PM on March 23, 2007

melted chocolate has about the consistency of silkscreen ink and it would harden once it dried. it might be hard to get out of the screen, though...
posted by beerbajay at 11:34 PM on March 23, 2007

I just googled "your photo on cake". I think that this or this may be what you want.
posted by amtho at 7:50 AM on March 24, 2007