A very light and dry sugar coral that can be used as a filler or background material for many cake decorating purposes. This recipe is a simple microwaved technique which turns a basic pastillage piece in to dry sugar foam-like coral that increases the original piece of pastillage by 10 times it’s volume.
There is no better way to create eatable clouds, rocks, coral, trees and shrubs for your cakes. By chopping (maybe with scissors) and breaking the coral in different sizes, they can be joined (with royal icing or chocolate) to make larger arrangements. One of the great things with sugar coral is that you can mix color into the pastillage before microwaving it.
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This idea was actually founded and developed by Chef Yener by coincidence. The original method of rock sugar is very old and tedious. Caster sugar has to be boiled with some water to a certain degree and then royal icing added, which caused bubbling and sudden crystallization. This method often ended up with failure and even if done properly, the result was too brittle (breaks and powderizes too easily and makes it difficult to work with) and slightly brownish in color (the microwaved method stays nice and white).
We hope the recipe works out for you and we would love to hear your comments below.
Hi Chef Serdar,
I made your coral/clouds using your pastillage recipe, and changed the coral ingredients to 500 weight with your calculator. At . There seemed to be a lot of icing sugar to add to the pastillage (333g pastillage/167g icing sugar), but I continued adding the sugar in 3 parts and warming in the microwave after each. Eventually it all incorporated into the paste – The split into 5 pieces (100g) and microwaved for about 50 seconds each one. The first 3 turned out perfect, but the last 2 just deflated and were not not useable. – I guess I should have given more time ?
Thank you for this recipe and method – It is so good.
You have to make sure that you do not open the microwave to check in between. Yes, it looks like you need to microwave longer.
would you colour the pastillage before making coral or is it ok to colour it after with airbrush?
Thank you
Before of course. You can air brush a little for some shading. Too much airbrush for deeper tone will cause some melting. Thanks
Hi,how much of icing sugar did you put into the pastillaje to make a rock,because I did 50% and dindt grow up to much,thanks.
Can Sugar Coral be carved into ‘special’ shapes like vehicle tires/wheels, or must it only be broken into pieces?
It is very brittle. It can only be used as irregular broken pieces. thanks
I will be practically trying this and already mentally working out the many things that can also be done with same i’m already excited ( in my minds eye I already see coral reefs,mountains,jagged edged stones ect).Thanks for sharing you are such a teacher.
It would be great if your Classes and website did things in United States information. Meaning pounds and ounces for weight. Its very confusing this way….or made it easier for us to figure this out. I love your work; and would love to try this recipe but I am lost with the measurements.
Hi Debbie,
Don’t get discouraged, buy yourself a kitchen scale and make the recipes using the measurements provided. You will get used to making it with the provided measurements and find that it actually works better than our cups and ounces. I too live in the United States, and I encourage you to buy that kitchen scale and give it a shot. You’ll never go back to cups and ounces and will begin using grams. It is a FAR more ACCURATE way to measure and you’ll find your recipes coming out better than ever before! Give it a try, and come back and let us know how it’s working! Everyone will provide assistance it needed! Good luck! You can do it, and you’ll love the results in your baking!
I totally agree with this. Thanks, Holly, almost 50 years I deal with recipes and use Excel for multiplications. I use gram for absolutely everything even pinch of salt has a number in my spreadsheet like 0.001 means 1 g. Can you imagine if I start from a small recipe says 1.5 ts and I want to make 10 times larger recipe? Potential problem knocking the door.
this one really didn’t work for me. i didn’t see it grow. when it came out of the microwave, it was bubbling, but then it shrank. any suggestions? i used parchment paper in the coffee mug. dont know if that make a difference.
try adding more icing sugar in to recipe before microwave.
How long does the coral last for once it’s completely made?
At least a year i would say. I never seen my corals get mouldy.
This sounds like fun and I am looking forward to trying it!! Thank you for the recipe!
Great! Please let us know how it goes and if you have any problems. Thanks 🙂