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Don’t waste money on edible googly eyes you can buy at the store, instead make hundreds candy eyes for pennies. They are the perfect thing to decorate all of your holiday treats.
Why You’ll Love This Recipe!
Halloween-ify your treats! Candy eyes are the easiest way to dress up any food or favorite Halloween treat and Halloween-ify it! Turn an ordinary treat into a Halloween treats with just a couple of edible eyeballs.
Save money! You can buy candy eyes at the craft store but you only get a couple dozen and they can be pricey. With this recipe for white candy eyes you can literally make hundreds of candy eyeballs for what you would pay for one small bag of them at the store.
Handful of ingredients. The eyes are made with royal icing that is easy to make at home and it dries hard and stores for a long time in an air tight container.
Ingredients
- Egg Whites or Meringue Powder
- Powdered Sugar or Confectioner Sugar
- Water
- Decorating Tip – Use a number 3 or 4 round tip
- Decorating Bag – I use a disposable cake decorating bag
- Black Food Coloring
How To Make Edible Googly Candy Eyes
Start by making the Royal Icing.
- Beat egg whites large bowl with mixer at high speed until foamy
- Gradually add sugar.
- Beat at high speed until thickened and desired consistency. (see below for tips)
- When using meringue powder, just combine the powder sugar with the meringue powder and mix to combine. Add in water and beat at high speed until thickened and desired consistency.
- Tip # 1. The trick with using royal icing is getting it the right consistency, not too thick and not too thin. One trick is to dip a spoon into the icing and let some of the icing fall back into the bowl. You want that icing you just dripped in to disappear into the icing in the bowl within about 10 seconds or so. If it takes longer add a teeny, tiny bit more water. Only a few drops at a time.
- Tip # 2. You can also run a knife through the icing and if the indentation made starts to close back in on itself, it is the right consistency. (See video below for tips too)
- After making the royal icing, add black food coloring to 1/3 of the batch.
Piping Candy Eyes
- Cover a cookie sheet with parchment paper.
- Attach a number 3 or 4 round tip onto a disposable cake decorating bag and fill with white royal icing. You can also just snip the tip of the bag off and not use a decorating tip.
- Hold the bag straight up, make dots of icing.
Tips
- If your icing is the right consistency the little point that is left will settle back down into the eye. But if it doesn’t, add a few more drops of water to your icing. If the eye spreads too much, your frosting is too thin. Just add a little more of the mix.
- And be sure and keep your tip clean by wiping it off often. Royal icing sets up quickly and it will start to harden on the outside of your tip.
The number of eyeballs you will get will depend on how big or small you make them, but you will be able to make hundreds! You can make a fun assortment of candy eyeballs. Any shape from small candy eyes to large candy eye balls.
- Next, put the black royal icing in a piping bag with the same size tip. Go back and add the pupil to each eye. Just add a little black, you don’t even really need to squeeze the bag, adding too much will cause it to pile up on top of the eye ball. (In the photo below, I have a bit too much black added and you can see the little pile of black)
- Let them sit out to air dry for 12-24 hours to harden up. Larger eyes may require 36 hours. They should be dry to the touch and easily come off the parchment paper. If they stick to the paper they are not dry enough yet.
Pair These With:
- Halloween Donuts
- Halloween Hot Chocolate
- Mummy Dogs
- Mummy Meatballs
- Cupcakes – add candy eyes to your favorite cupcake to Halloween-ify it!
- Mummy Brie
Frequently Asked Questions
What kind of food coloring do you use?
I like to use the Black Americolor Food Color. Make sure to keep it covered with a damp paper towel so it won’t set up or dry out. It can be hard to get a really deep black.
How long will googly eyes last?
If stored in an airtight container they will last for months, eve years! If they are exposed to moisture though they will soften up and fall apart. A small divided tackle box is the perfect way to store them by size.
Check out more fun Halloween recipes:
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Candy Eyes
Ingredients
- 4 egg whites or 4 Tbsp meringue powder
- 4 cups powdered sugar
- water as needed
- black gel food coloring
Instructions
Royal Icing
- Beat egg whites large bowl with mixer at high speed until foamy
- Gradually add sugar
- Beat at high speed until thickened and desired consistency
- If using meringue powder, add meringue powder into the bowl with the powdered sugar, stir to combine and then add in water and beat to right consistency.
- If it is too thick add a few drops a water, a little at a time. If it is too runny add some more sugar.
Candy Eyes
- Cover a cookie sheet with parchment paper.
- Fill a disposable cake bag with a number 3 or 4 round tip attached with 2/3 of the white royal icing.
- Holding the bag straight up, make dots of white icing.
- Add black food coloring into remaining icing. Put the black royal icing in a piping bag with the same number tip. Go back and add a small black dot on each white dot to make the pupil.
- Let them sit out to air dry for 12-24 hours to harden. Larger eyes may take 35 hours to dry. They are dry when they are dry to the touch and lift easily off the parchment paper.
Tips & Notes:
- If your icing is the right consistency the little point that is left will settle back down into the eye. But if it doesn’t, add a few more drops of water to your icing. If the eye spreads too much, your frosting is too thin. Just add a little more of the mix.
- And be sure and keep your tip clean by wiping it off often. Royal icing sets up quickly and it will start to harden on the outside of your tip.
Nutrition Facts:
Basma Mohamed says
Love this recipe, do you know if i could use these in cookies? Ive seen some baking inspiration where they make chocolate chip cookies and they use candy eyes instead of chocolate chips and wanted to know if these would hold up in the oven?
Nicki says
Thank you for this tutorial – they turned out perfect. The only change I would note is to pipe the black closer to when you pipe the whites so that the pupils are not raised. They came out more pro looking when I did a few rows at a time vs piping all of the whites then all of the pupils at the same time
Sewpollyesther says
I just made these using cocoa powder instead of black colouring, mainly because I didn’t have any to hand, but it might be a good option for people wanting to avoid colours too.
At a glance you don’t notice that the pupils are black not brown.
Looking forward to making some googly eye monster biscuits this week…
Leigh Anne says
Love the idea of using cocoa powder. Will definitely try it next time. Googly eye monster biscuits sound so fun!
Crystal says
Thank you so much for the idea and the recipe. If you make the little black dots, and let them dry a bit first, you could then pipe out the whites, and embed the pupils into the eye, so it would be flatter. You could even make colored irises by piping out some colored icing in between the black and white. Can’t wait to have fun with this and see what else I can make by piping out royal icing.
Leigh Anne says
Great idea!!
Sam says
I am currently working on a demonstration speech for my class and I have chosen to demonstrate how to decorate Halloween cupcakes and these googly eyes are perfect! I’ll be making them tomorrow morning and I can’t wait to see how they turn out, thank you for sharing this awesome idea!!
Leigh Anne says
Good lucky with your presentation – sounds so fun!