Edible ink printing

A cake topped with a photograph of a tiger, printed on edible paper

Edible ink printing is the process of creating preprinted images with edible food colors onto various confectionery products such as cookies, cakes, or pastries. Designs made with edible ink can either be preprinted or created with an edible printer, a specialty device which transfers an image onto a thin, edible paper. Edible paper is made of starches and sugars and printed on with edible food colors. Some edible inks and paper materials have been approved by the Food and Drug Administration and carry its generally recognized as safe certification.

The first papers of this process used rice paper, while modern versions use frosting sheets. Such paper may be consumed without harmful effects. Most edible paper has no significant flavor and limited texture. Edible paper may be printed on by a standard printer and, upon application to a moist surface, dissolves while maintaining a high resolution. The end effect is that the image (usually a photograph) on the paper appears to be printed on the icing.

Edible printer inks have now become prevalent and are used in conjunction with special ink printers. Ink that is not specifically marketed as being edible may be harmful or fatal if swallowed. Edible toner for laser printers is not currently available. Any inkjet or bubblejet printer can be used to print, although resolution may be poor, and care should be taken to avoid contaminating the edible inks with previously used inks. Inkjet or bubblejet printers can be converted to print using edible ink, and cartridges of edible ink are commercially available.

Some edible inks are powdered, but if they are easily soluble in water they can also be used as any other edible ink without reducing quality. Edible paper is used on cakes, cookies, cupcakes and marshmallows.

References

Paper

History Manufacture/Papermaking

Types	Blotting Bond Construction Cotton Rag Crêpe Display Dó Asphalt Glassine India Korean Kraft Laid Manila Newsprint Oatmeal Onionskin Origami Baking Building Rice Rolling Security Seed Copy Tar Thermal Tissue Tracing Transfer Tree-free Wallpaper Washi Waterproof Wax Wood-free Wove Writing

Materials	Fiber crop Paper chemicals Papyrus Wood pulp Algal bloom (Shiro alga carta)

Specifications	Grammage Density Size Units of paper quantity Surface chemistry of paper Wet strength

Manufacture and process	Bleaching of wood pulp Calender Conical refiner Deinking Paper pollution Environmental impact of paper Hollander beater Kraft process Organosolv Paper cut Paper machine Paper recycling Soda pulping Sulfite process

Industry	Paper industry In Europe In Canada In India In Japan In the United States Paper mill List of paper mills

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