Glitter Sugar

Many have probably seen the posts and pictures all over about glitter sugar, do it yourself.  Well, for the Northern Foundation Ball I decided that I would make some glitter sugar to subsitute for glitter as a cheap alternative.  I wanted one of the options for centerpieces to be a vase filled with sugar and mask stuck in the sugar.
Well I found a link on pinterest. It told me how much sugar and food coloring to use. I mixed it in a ziplock bag and you can see it is a little wet.

Yes, that photo behind the bag is the one that came with the pinterest instructions I found.

 

I just spread the sugar out a bit to bake it.

The instructions said to bake it for 10 minutes at 350 degrees.  The sugar melted...

 

I had seen some comments that said the sugar melted or clumped together a bit, but to just break it up and it would look like glitter.  It didn't really break up much and it was burnt.  It smelled, looked, and tasted burnt. So I was set on trying to figure things out.

I used the same measurements and mixing method.  1/4 cup sugar and enough drops to color the sugar the color I wanted it.  About 5 drops.

 

I decided to lower the temperature to 200 degrees. Please note, I let my oven cool then preheated it up again to be sure the temperature wasn't over 200. The photo above is what it looked like when I took it out of the oven.

 

It only took 2 minutes.  I broke up the clumps and wallah! It turned out pretty good. 

Well, they went with a few of my other ideas instead, but this will be good to know for the future.  Whether I'm looking to cut costs or decorating a cake.