Almond Paste Rose

Prepare the ingredients for the almond paste rose. You can use coloured almond paste or colour it yourself with a few drop of food ink. In the latter case, you will have to start from a white almond paste.

Form a sausage with the coloured almond paste of your choice.

Cut in 4 to 5 mm thick slices.

Prepare an almond paste base. You will use it to stick the layers with each other. When the rose will be finished, this base will be its core. It must have a large bottow fixed to the bench, and goes up to thin as a spike. The tip must be slightly rounded and the middle part must be slightly thinner (see picture).

Flour your bench area with and take the first slice of almond paste. Crush it with your thumb to make it flat. It will be the first petal.

With a cornstarched metal spatula, flatten the rim of this first petal. Hold firmly the tip of the spatula with the left hand and move back and forth with your right hand to flatten the rim.

Remove at once by quickly passing the spatula under the petal.

Position the first petal on the base. You just made the core of the rose.

Repeat steps 5 to 7 to create more petals.

Put them around the core, intercalating the petals between one another.

Your rose is made of a core part. Around it, put 2 petals to ride partly on each other. Start again with 3 petals. And then with 4, and so on. This way there will be an increasing number of layers with an increasing number of petals. When the rose starts to take shape, squeeze the bottom with your fingers to make it stick well together.

Go on like this until you obtain a fair sized rose.

The amount of petals will make the rose more or less open. It allows you to make rose blossoms, semi-open or completely open.

When the rose is finished, cut the bottom with a knife. Twist the petals' rim to give them a natural shape.

With a green almond paste, you can also prepare leaves, marking the veins with the back of a knife.