The Best No-Cook Playdough Recipe

This is my first post for sensory seekers, and I wanted it to be special and simple. I thought about it for a while but it was my little girl who made the decision for me. It had to be Playdough as it is by far her favourite.

Playdough is truly an amazing sensory recipe. It’s very easy to make with things that are usually in your cupboard and are cheap to buy. You can change it to almost any colour you want with dye. You can change the smell using ground spices, herbs or essences. Its baby safe with no toxic ingredients and you can do so much with it.

 

I’ve tried a few different methods for making playdough including on the hob and in the microwave but for me the easiest and fastest method is a no-cook method using boiled water from the kettle.

So here's what you'll need:

2 cups of Plain flour

½ cup salt (I use cooking Salt)

2 tbsp of oil (any edible oil will do, vegetable, olive and coconut are all great)

2 tbsp Cream of Tartare (not strictly necessary, it helps give the playdough elasticity but you can make it without)

1 ½ cups Boiling water

*Variable ingredients – food dye, herbs, spices, essence

 

Add everything to a big mixing bowl and stir with a spoon as the water will make it very hot for a few minutes. I usually then add flour until I reach the consistency desired as it can be a little sticky.

If you want to add food dye you can either add it with the water before it’s all mixed, or if you want to make more than one colour then separate your dough, make a small well in each and add a few drops of dye. I have found that gel dyes give a more vibrant colour and you might want to get some latex gloves (mine are actually self-tanning gloves bought from boots) unless you want dye on your hands. I rinse, dry and re-use my gloves.

 For this dough I added orange dye and ground nutmeg for scent (going with an autumn feel).

 

 So now you've got your dough, what can you do with it?

·         Use cookie cutters to make shapes.
·         Make pretend food and play cafes.
·         Make little people.
·         Encourage the senses by asking your child how it smells, is it stretchy? Can you bend it? Can you cut it? Etc
·         There’s a whole host of tools that can be used with dough like rolling pins and cutting wheels, there's a great starter set on amazon….here
·         Let your child have independent play and see where their imagination takes them.

 For more ideas check out this blog post 

Please feel free to comment if you use and like this recipe, let me know how it went for you, what you did and if you and your child enjoyed it.

Thanks and have fun  :)