Try our perfect playdough recipe

Save this easy activity for a rainy day indoors

Try our perfect playdough recipe
by Natalie Keeler

If pandemic parenting taught us anything, it's that it pays to be prepared. Even with lockdowns (hopefully) behind us, there will be sick days and wet weekends sent to challenge us. 

This playdough recipe is the perfect cure for when you're cooped up indoors. The recipe uses ingredients you probably already have in your kitchen cupboards, and mixing it up only takes a few minutes.


Ingredients

  • 8 tbsp flour
  • 2 tbsp table salt
  • 60ml warm water
  • 1 tbsp vegetable oil
  • Food colouring

Easy playdough recipe

Step 1

Mix 8 tbsp flour with 2 tbsp table salt in a large bowl.

Step 2

Put 60ml warm water in a jug with 1 tbsp vegetable oil and a few drops of food colouring.

Step 3

Pour the mixture from the jug into the bowl and let your child stir it.

Step 4

Turn it out onto a lightly floured surface and help your child squish and roll it until smooth. You can add extra food colouring at this stage. Store in a sandwich bag in the fridge.

You can also watch a video on BBC Good Food.


How do you stop playdough drying out?

Add water and massage it into the dough a bit at a time to bring it back to life.

To make new colours: massage two pieces of dough into each other (blue and yellow to make green for example). Keep folding and squishing and the colours will blend.

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Maths

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Creativity

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Science

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Sensory Play

Learning guide

Playdough is filled with learning opportunities – and just the process of making it teaches your child maths (measuring the ingredients) and science (mixing them together). As they manipulate the dough to create different shapes, they’ll be also working on their fine motor skills, which help with pencil control when they’re learning to write. There’s plenty of sensory benefits too – can your child describe what the dough feels like? What about when you add a splash of water? See if they can make any new colours by blending two different pieces of dough together.