So, my daughter drew a picture for me that she wanted on a cake, I covered her picture with parchment paper and traced it with black royal icing the proceeded to "flood" the out lined parts like a coloring sheet. It looked beautiful! Until I let it sit to dry and came back and the black bled into the white What can I do to prevent this from happening again?

Pipe the black first and let that dry before flooding in the new colors.

I made royal icing this weekend and I was having trouble with the black icing I made. When it dried I touched it and it turned powdery. The only thing I did differently was use Wlton black coloring. I ran out of Americolor and had to use it )= the other colors I made came out fine............I wonder if that had anything to do with it?

I never had that problem with Americolor. And I just did a test and made lines with all the different colors I did and the black was the only one that was messed up. So the only conclusion I came up with is the brand of coloring, maybe because I had to use more than usual.........I will never run out of Americolor again....LOL

The amount of color could have had something to do with it, but I've used Wilton's black to make royal icing and outline with it with out any problems.

Also like buttercream if you color the black ahead of time, the colors will deepen to darker tons.

Where do I order the Americolor, I think I'd like to try that brand. Thank you!

If you leave it to dry at a heat source ie in front of an open warm oven or on top of a radiator it will dry quicker and hopefully prevent this.

I've been having trouble with that same bleeding issue between dark and light colors when using butter cream or royal icing. You can google alternative icing recipes. Try one that uses cream of tarter. I'm told it acts as a thickening agent in much the same way that cornstarch does (I've found recipes that use that, too) but differently than by adding confectioners sugar to thicken and thus reduces bleeding. Also, on one of the better sites (more detail and layering work) I use I notice that in her step by step projects she lets each touching color dry a full 24 hours before they touch. I have been doing 8-12 hours depending on whether it's a base color or smaller detail work. The longer I let them set the less they (sometimes) seem to bleed. Red, whites, blacks & greens seem to be the worst bleeders. Anyway, this is the information that I have gathered. I have not put any of this into practice (This is where I am on my learning curve).  The one thing that I have put into practice that helps and adds some texture is to draw and flood what designs you can onto wax paper and let them dry no less than 12 hours and then use the lighter icing to act as a glue to hold the design on. For things like flowers or my mini-mickey decals or flower centers it has been just wonderful! Oh, and set lighter colors longer (and before) darker colors. Anyway, that's my two cents.

AI would outline in the flooding colour, then flood leave to dry and then out line in the bold colour. The bleeding is because od the consistency of the flood colour

AMy tips to stop flooding - make the color at least a day ahead of time so it sits and 'incorporates' together more. To make black use coco powder to darken it first, then add Americolor black. You only need to make it charcoal, it will darken to black when it dries.

Pipe the black, leave it to dry overnight before adding another color.

Good luck!