How to Make Violets With Icing

Don't forget to add the yellow center in your icing violets.

Adding flowers made out of icing is an effective way to dress up any type of cake -- from sheet cakes, to round ones, to cupcakes. If violets are your flower of choice for a cake, study the color and the shape of the petals in order to accurately simulate violets as an icing decoration. Their rich purple hue and flat, rounded petals can be recreated with the proper instruments and the right shade of food coloring. Does this Spark an idea?

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White icing
Violet food coloring
Mixing bowl
Mixing utensil
2 disposable decorating bags
Spoon
#59 decorating tip
Flower nail
Yellow icing
#1 decorating tip

Instructions

- 1
  
  Make the violet-colored icing. Scoop the white icing into a mixing bowl and add a few drops of the violet food coloring. Blend the ingredients together with a mixing utensil, such as a fork, whisk or spatula. Continue adding the violet food coloring and mixing the icing until you achieve the deep purple color of violets.
- 2
  
  Fill one disposable decorating bag with the purple icing. Open the bag at the wide point, and use a spoon to transfer the icing from the mixing bowl into the bag. A disposable decorating bag is a necessary tool for piping icing into shapes such as flowers. Shake the bag slightly to get the icing all the way down to the pointed tip at the bottom.
- 3
  
  Place a small decorating tip on the bottom of the decorating bag. The tip should be specific for making petals. In the baking industry, this tip number is 59. You will be making a five-petal flower with the decorating tip.
- 4
  
  Hold the flower nail in your non-dominant hand, and the decorating bag in your dominant hand. A flower nail is a metal decorating tool that is used to control how you pipe flower petals with icing.
- 5
  
  Squeeze the decorating bag gently, as you hold it at a 45-degree angle. As you squeeze with your dominant hand, spin the nail with your other hand so that the petal shape is created. Pipe the icing from the point of the petal and out to the wider end, then bring the icing back to the point. Release the pressure and stop piping. Move onto the next petal to the side of the first. Make three petals in a row, which will be your bottom petals.
- 6
  
  Create two top petals that complete the five-petal violet. Make the two top petals the same way, but make them shorter and wider than the bottom petals. Add a top petal by slightly overlapping where the icing starts. Rather than placing the petal directly next to the bottom petals, start the petal over the side of the bottom petal to create a layered effect. Form a second top petal the same way.
- 7
  
  Fill the second disposable decorating bag with yellow icing. Use a small decorating tip, #1, to pipe two small dots in the center of the purple petals.
- 8
  
  Remove the flower from the flower nail, and set it on the cake for decoration.