If you’ve ever wanted to add a little artistic flair to your sourdough, painting with natural food coloring is a magical way to take your loaf to the next level! Here’s how I do it and the tools I love to use.

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Keep Your Supplies Bread-Only!

When painting with natural food coloring, it’s super important to keep your supplies separate from anything you’ve used for real painting. You don’t want to mix your bread tools with supplies that have been used with traditional paints or chemicals. Even if they’re just small traces of non-food-safe paint, it can affect your loaf and make it unsafe to eat.

So, make sure you’ve got a dedicated set of brushes, palettes, and other tools that are strictly for your sourdough art. This keeps everything clean and safe while still allowing you to express your creativity on every loaf!

Let’s keep it food-safe and fun—only paint your bread with tools that are strictly for the job! 🎨✨

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Tools You’ll Need:

1. Watercolor Brushes – I use a set of artist watercolor brushes, which I reserve just for painting bread. No mixing with regular painting supplies here!
2. Watercolor Half Pans – I’ve got a set of empty watercolor half pans that I fill with my “paint.” You don’t need fancy pans though, a simple artist palette from Dollar General works perfectly, or you can just spoon your colors onto a plate. These are the pans I like
3. Mason Jars or Cups – I keep one jar for rinsing my brush and one for loading up on paint. This helps prevent muddy colors and keeps your water cleaner longer (although, let’s be honest, I don’t always stick to this rule, but it does help reduce water changes).
4. Paper Towels – These come in handy if you’ve overloaded your brush with too much color and need to blot a bit before painting.
5. Toothpick – A toothpick is helpful to clean out any rice flour that may have snuck into your score lines.
6. Scored & Baked Loaf – While you don’t have to score your loaf before painting, I find it helps keep the color from bleeding into unexpected places and gives your design a bit more structure.

If you would like to see everything I use you can find a list of everything I use on my amazon storefront . Please know if you purchase using my link I may make a small commission.

If you do choose to use my link, please know my family and I are deeply grateful for your support!

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“Color is a power which directly influences the soul.”

Wassily Kandinsky

Now, Let’s Talk About the Colors!

Natural food coloring brings out the most beautiful, earthy tones, and I love experimenting with different colors. Here are the brands and ingredients I use in my palette:

• Ruby Red Radish (Suncore Foods) – for vibrant red and pink hues
• Orange (Supernatural) – bright and warm, perfect for autumn-inspired tones
• Yellow (Supernatural) – a soft, sunny yellow for a light pop of color
• Ceremonial Matcha (Aiya) – for that beautiful green, full of life
• Blue Spirulina (Suncore Foods) – adds a lovely blue-green
• Blue Butterfly Pea Flower (Suncore Foods) – for a striking, deep blue
• Purple Sweet Potato (Suncore Foods) – rich purple tones
• Purple (Supernatural) – mixed with lemon juice for a lovely, bright pink
• Black Cocoa Powder (Anthony’s Goods) – perfect for deep, dark accents

I love experimenting with all these colors and mixing them to create unique effects on my bread. The possibilities are endless, and the result is always a beautiful loaf that’s as artistic as it is delicious.

Stay tuned for more painting posts, we’re going to do a deep dive into the world of sourdough painting!

I would love to hear from you, about your experience with sourdough painting. If you have any questions I would love to help you find an answer!

If you found this post about sourdough painting tools helpful please like and share!

Happy painting, and may your loaves always rise to the occasion (and look fabulous doing it!) ✨

“Every artist dips his brush in his own soul, and paints his own nature into his pictures.”

Henry Ward Beecher