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Working with colourings can really bring your baked goods to life. Whilst some people focus on flavour, a lot of people prefer to focus on presentation. If you tend to find yourself focussing more on the latter, then you know yourself just how important it is to use colours that are eye-catching, enticing and, above all, accurate. We have seen the cakes with the oddly luminous flowers, or the red-wine effect drip that is more the colour of a strawberry daiquiri drip, and one of the colours that has been hardest to get accurate is teal. Teal is a colour used a lot more commonly than you may think, which I am sure you will realise the next time you receive a request to bake for a Frozen party, or to create a Tiffany style box cake.
Table of Contents
An Approach Using Basic Colours
So, after experimenting with various colours, there are two ways to reach your best teal colour, depending on the exact shade you want and the food colouring you have access to. The most simple way is to mix a bright blue with a darker green. You may need to have some black and white one hand, to help lighten and darken. If the colour goes slightly too yellow, then you can add a darker blue (or the blue you have, combined with an extremely small drop of black), and if the colour goes too blue, try adding some lighter, limier green (you can make this yourself with a normal green and a dash of yellow). This process will take some experimenting in order to reach your desired colour, but is the easiest process if you have access to fewer colours.
A More Specific Approach
Alternatively, if you have access to more colours, then the following process gets you the perfect teal. If you can source ‘Mint Green’, ‘Electric Blue’ and have a bright white to hand. Using a pallet, have each colour lined up, and using a very fine brush, slowly take a drop from each and begin to mix. This will be a repeated process in order to reach the exact shade of teal you would like, and to also create enough quantity for your use. The brush will help you to not overdo it with any colour, but if you are looking to make even smaller alterations then I would recommend using a toothpick to add the slightest drop of each colour as you go.
Teal Me Up!
So, using a basic blue with a darker green will help you achieve that teal colour, but it is handy to always have some white and black, and you may also need to add some small dashes of yellow and navy. Alternatively, you can go on the hunt for some specific shades, and by adding little dashes of each you will eventually reach that perfect, ocean-colour teal!
FAQs
How do you make teal icing?
There are multiple ways to make your own teal icing, 2 more simple techniques are discussed in the article.
How do you make teal with food coloring?
Your best bet is to find the specific colours mentioned in the second part of the article, but if you are restricted with colours then working with a green and blue should get you there, with the availability of black, white and yellow to help reach your desired shade.
What colors make teal buttercream?
As buttercream is already usually quite a creamy colour, you may need little to no white. Create your teal at the side first, experimenting with small dollops of the buttercream. Use green and blue to begin with and then add your icing. You may need to add in some white or yellow depending on your desired colour. The amounts of colouring will need to be increased as the amount of icing increases, otherwise your colour will become slightly more pale.
