They're not just for apples anymore!

November 1, 2007 4:09 PM

I am researching the best way to accomplish this task: make life-sized, edible, realistic replicas of a razor blade, suitable to bring to a Halloween party next year. What sort of candy medium would work bestl?
posted by freshwater_pr0n to food & drink (8 answers total)

Making anything that looks metallic but isn't toxic is hard.

If you make them out of sugar/hard candy they could actually be sharp enough to at least be unpleasant to eat.
posted by aubilenon at 4:29 PM on November 1, 2007

Fondant
posted by lannanh at 4:33 PM on November 1, 2007

basic hard candy, taffy, or toffee?

With these media, I'm guessing you would need to make a mold of a real razor blade... but since a real one is so thin, you might be better off making one out of something else thicker, then making a mold out of that.

I'm not candymaking-savvy enough to know how to pour the mold for best results.

I'm thinking there's gotta be someplace online to buy them too.
posted by Rykey at 4:35 PM on November 1, 2007

Seconding Rykey-- if you don't mind thickening it up a bit I think it'll be easier (and still believeable enough as a razor). I haven't done much candymaking but chocolate/white chocolate holds a good mold-- and you could probably get a food grade metallic paint that could even maybe be sprayed on?
posted by actionpact at 4:41 PM on November 1, 2007

gum paste.
Gum paste is really a pliable "sugar dough", mixed with gums, which makes it easy to shape like modeling clay. Because of its sugar content, dries hard with the texture and crispness of a Necco wafer, and can be very brittle. It can be tinted, painted on or dusted with decorating dusts. It is considered "technically" edible, but it is not palatable, especially because it's bland and doesn't taste very good.

Gum paste is versatile and is stronger than Fondant. It can be rolled very thin, used for making delicate shapes or molded into figurines, trees, and animals. Pieces can be "glued" together to make large standing ones. Gum paste dries very quickly if thin, but takes a long time to dry if thick, sometimes 24 hours or more. Decorations can be made weeks in advance and temporarily stored in airtight containers, in a cool, dark place or kept there indefinitely away from heat or moisture, which can soften them

posted by spinturtle at 5:11 PM on November 1, 2007

If you're not hung up on getting the colors right or the thickness dead on, I'd recommend chocolate. I imagine the easiest thing would be to get some kind of food-safe modeling clay and push a razor blade down into it to make a slightly thicker impression. Then pour the chocolate in, let it set. People will recognie the overall shape, and chocolate has zero chance of cutting someone's tongue, whereas the same thing made out of hard candy definitely could.
posted by Deathalicious at 5:27 PM on November 1, 2007

Why not use regular Hersey's Chocolate bars with the brown wrapper taken off and the silver wrapper left on..then people could grab one to take with them or eat at the party. There wouldn't be any dealing with toxicity since you can put the adhesive on the metallic wrapper. Life-sized being 3ft-5ft tall, this is probably the most cost effective way to cover that much area with a metalic finish.

If you were looking for something more extravagant than that, I apologize.
posted by smart_ask at 10:49 PM on November 1, 2007

um..i must be having issues with "life-sized" today. ignore my previous post
posted by smart_ask at 10:51 PM on November 1, 2007