Sugar cubes

[welo]

Okay, this is gonna sound weird but I can't post it on my forum because my wife is a moderator there, and this concerns a gift for her.

I had this idea to build a little castle for her for her birthday next month, and mortar the whole thing together with icing. I already baought most of the stuff to do it. The thing is, I dunno how to cut a sugar cube in half.

Would anyone here possibly know anything about this?

Thanks-- Will

[G.Bloke]

I'm reminded of the technique for cutting polystyrene where you use a heated wire, however with sugar it would probably just end in a sticky, smelly mess

[Still Shady]

woah man! sounds complicated but good luck! Sorry can't help you with sugar cubes!

[TeeJay]

I don't know if this will work, just a suggestion.

Put the sugar cube in the freezer for a few minutes then get a sandpaper and grind it to the size you want.

[hobbes747]

An Exacto knife? I've never tried. I would assume the sugar cubes would have to be fresh and not brittle.

Or you could tell Bjork that she doesn't need the backup band.

[welo]

Thanks folks .

Well, I resorted to marthastewart.com and found it you score the cubes with a knife, then you can just cut them with kitchen scissors. However, with the little "holiday house" they built, they were using double-sized sugar cubes (which I can't find right now). This method leaves a bit to be desired with the regular-sized ones.

I considered the sandpaper idea before too, yet since it looks like I'm going to need over a hundred of these things, I need a better production method .

One thing I thought of is to throw them into the microwave for a few secs and see if that softens them up enough to cut. I'll let you know if it works (I'm sure you'll all wait breathlessly ). Meantime, if any has other ideas I'm all ears.

[EHG]

I have absolutely no idea if this will work but perhaps if you laid the cubes out in a single layer and used a spray bottle with water and misted them til they started to disolved to the desired size and perhaps put them in the microwave for a few seconds to stop any further deterioration of size or shape???

or you could build or (buy?) a mold and make your own - however Ihave no idea where you would purchase such a mold nor do I know what you would mix with the sugar in order for it to harden - water I imagine.

why not mortar the whole thing with whitesh-gray icing squeezed out through a cake decorator and then just use a popsicle stick to smooth it and draw lines in it??

last but not least go to a bakery known for fancy cakes and try to talk to a baker - tell him what your up to and see if he will give you some hints - He/she might or he/she might not then again he/she might try to throw you into the oven for trying to steal trade secrets!

edit

oh duh I see you want to use the cubes for the construction and the icing to hold it together - - I think you need to find a specialty shop and find a mold of some sort - look under bakery supplies perhaps or if you have the patience I think you could probably with popsicle sticks and a tad of childrens safe white glue make your own mold

quackers