The Pioneer Woman Tasty Kitchen
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Play Dough

5.00 Mitt(s) 4 Rating(s)4 votes, average: 5.00 out of 54 votes, average: 5.00 out of 54 votes, average: 5.00 out of 54 votes, average: 5.00 out of 54 votes, average: 5.00 out of 5

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Level: Easy

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Description

Homemade playdough is so much better than store bought. It is soft and colorful, easy to make and inexpensive. The best colors come from using Wilton brand food coloring. Kids’ faces always light up when I make playdough.

Ingredients

  • 3 cups Flour
  • 1-½ cup Salt
  • 6 teaspoons Cream Of Tartar
  • 3 cups Water
  • 3 Tablespoons Oil
  • Wilton Variety Pack Food Coloring

Preparation

In a large saucepan combine flour, salt and cream of tartar. Then stir in the liquid ingredients: water and oil. Mix thoroughly.

Turn on medium heat. Stir the batter continually until the dough pulls away from the sides of the pan. This will take about 15 minutes depending on the heat level. You don’t want to burn it but it needs to come together as a dough ball in the pan.

Remove it from heat, allowing it to cool a bit. Then pull the dough out, knead it completely. It should be uniform, no lumps and very soft and pliable.

Now you can divide it into portions for coloring. I’ve used 7 colors of the rainbow which makes portions about the size of your fist. The Wilton food color comes in small jars. It is like a paste, therefore adding no liquid to the dough. Scoop out a toothpick full of paste and knead it into the dough. Add color until you’ve reached desired richness of color and it is uniformly colored. Then duplicate this with each color.

Note: Your hands will stain but it’s ‘food’ coloring so it’s not harmful. If you wish, wear gloves.

Store the playdough in plastic airtight containers.

7 Comments

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PamFromNY on 11.30.2010

Liquid food coloring is fine unless you use too much, like with coloring red. Red seems to take the most to reach it’s color so I would avoid red, the rest should be fine.

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labdoodlvr on 11.20.2010

Yes, this does look like fun…we will be trying this over the Thanksgiving break. Thank you for sharing!

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tntkitchen on 11.14.2010

this looks like fun! I have regular food coloring (not the paste) would it work or would it be too much liquid?

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ADashOfInsanity on 11.14.2010

I worked for years as a daycare teacher and the kids loved when we would make play dough! I now make it for my own kids, and they have a great time. I love the way it feels when it’s still warm. I always store it in a ziploc bag or old bowl with a tight-fitting lid. It lasts a very long time! Thanks for submitting the recipe…I can never remember where I put my copy!

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PamFromNY on 11.14.2010

Yes! The dining room table is always spread with colorful creations! I am the always trying to guard the playdough from ‘mixing’. Just can’t bear to see the colors fade into ugly brown.

This will last a long time if stored well – airtight – probably a year. Of course, if it’s being played with for hours and hours everday it may not last a year. But it’s fun and inexpensive to make.

4 Reviews

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theambitioushousewife on 4.29.2013

Quick, easy, and my boys love it. They especially liked getting to pick out what colors they wanted. I did only make 2/3 of the recipe and I also added 1 tsp of almond extract to the dough while it was cooking just so that it didn’t have that super strong “homemade playdough” smell.

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rfreeby on 8.19.2011

My two boys and I made this this morning and had a blast! Thank you!

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cylina on 12.26.2010

easy, and the kiddos loved it.

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Mrs. G on 12.4.2010

I made this with a friend and her daughter and it was a huge hit. I was so thrilled to see it was exactly like the real thing! I will never buy play dough again! Thanks so much!

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