Playing with playdough was always one of my favorite pastime as a kid.

Although I have no children of my own, I have many friends who do, and who are always looking for ways to keep their little ones occupied and possibly out of trouble at the same time. The problem with playdough is that kids LOVE to put it in their mouth, and no matter how safe, child-friendly, etc. it may be, that's generally not a very good idea because of all the chemicals, etc. The solution? Edible playdough!

Over the years I have made kilos of the stuff for my friends and their kids, tried many different recipes, until after many experiments I finally settled on this one which I thought I would share with you all. It's super easy, doesn't take too much time, and the "enjoyment/out of trouble factor" is almost 100% guaranteed

Happy playing!

Notes: I am providing "US-style" measures below because I have all my cooking gear/ measuring instruments in cups, etc. and that's what I use all the time for cooking, but I am sure that with any converter it is possible to find out how many grams, etc.

Edible Playdough

1 cup of water
1 cup of flour
1/4 cup of salt
1 tbsp coconut oil (any vegetable oil that you have at hand should do - I have tried sunflower seed oil, olive oil, and coconut oil, and my favorite one of all is the coconut oil)
2 tsp cream of tartar (usually, in recipes cream of tartar can be substituted with lemon juice or white vinegar, or, if in combination with baking soda, substituted altogether with baking powder. Since I could not find it in supermarkets in Zurich, I tried all of the above, but I was not satisfied with any of these options for the playdough. At the end, I found out I could get some at the pharmacy - it's called "Weinstein" - and used that and was satisfied)
natural food coloring (you can easily find these in any baking section at Coop or Migros)

Mix all of the ingredients in a small pot or saucepan, heat (low-medium) and keep stirring until the dough solidifies and starts sticking together, forming a "ball". You can then let it cool a bit and knead until it is smooth. Repeat the process to make as many colored balls of dough as you like (I usually make 3 or 4 different colors at a time). Tip: a couple of times I ran into the issue of having a dough that was too "crumbly", so I added a bit more coconut oil to make it smoother.

Thank you so much for this recipe! Where do you get your coconut oil from?

Thank you Federica! Some of my fondest memories as a child are when my mother made us peanut-butter playdough.

I'll be trying this out with a few little people of my acquaintance...

Meisie,

I bought it once from Aggarwal on Kernstrasse (Indian supermarket), and I am fairly certain I recall seeing it while browsing around at New Asia Market on Feldstrasse.

you can get the coconut oil in the sri lankan or Indian shops..

You're the best

Thanks!

I used to make this for my kids all the time, but never used coconut oil- so it can be left out or maybe replaced with a bit of vegetable oil.

Odile, you are 100% correct. I am just partial to coconut oil because I liked the texture it gave the dough compared to the other options, but as mentioned in the recipe, in fact any vegetable oil could do the job well

Mmm, maybe I should stop making the playdough for my friends' kids and make some for me??? Sometimes I wish I was still a kid, life was so much easier then, hehehe

This is pretty much the same recipe that I have used in schools for years, as well as for my own children. The only difference is that I use 1/2 cup of salt to one cup of flour. The recipe can easily be doubled or more - every ingredient gets doubled. I tend to make a 4 cp of flour recipe at the moment.

The cream of tartar seems to be important for keeping the dough from both either drying out too quickly ( and going crumbly) or absorbing moisture fro the air and ending up as a blobby mess after a couple of days.

Any cooking oil can be sued - I use whatever is the cheapest in whatever country I a living in at the time.

By the way, instead of cooking it all on the stove top, an easier way is to mix all dry ingredients together first, mix in the oil, then add the appropriate cups of boiling water. That gives you a very sloppy mixture, but keep stirring it on the bench and it all comes together within a minute of two. Almost instant dough.

BUT: "Edible" dough is not quite the right term. Licking or tasting a tiny bit will not cause any harm, but with that huge amount of salt in it, there is no way that this is edible as would be a proper cookie dough.

my mum used to make cooked playdough all the time - before they days of the commercial product.

A word of warning, though, it's not technically 'edible' - the salt content is excruciatingly high and although most kids wouldn't eat it because it tastes so yucky, it's not a food, and would not be appropriate to give to a child who perhaps has a developmental/behavioural problem and is going to consume it...if could make a child quite sick because of the salt content...

In fact, if your dog ate it, you would be recommended to see the vet, because of the high salt content.

According to the internet, the commercial play-doh is not that different to the traditional cooked stuff - water, salt and starch are the key ingredients...

Have Fun!

Keep your playdough in an airtight container, in the refrigerator, and adding a bit of oil to it will slow down the drying process...

It's not recommended that you put anything in it that will make it more 'attractive' to eat...

Biff, nice tip, thank you! I will try your suggestion - mixing the dry ingredients and adding the oil and boiling water later - next time I make some.

You are right on the "edible", it's actually pretty yucky to taste in my opinion, but the point is that at least it won't cause any harm if put in a little mouth

Why not just use pasta dough?

They they can take it home and eat it for dinner!

Tom

Please, tell me, where can I find cream of tartar here, or what is a German word for it? I've bought one pack at Sainsbury's, but somehow misplaced it and regret it a lot.

I can remember eating Playdough long before I can remember seeing recipies for "edible" Playdough

Which might explain a few things.....

.....................

you can get it at the apotheke!

but you'll have to ask for it - it's called Weinstein

Wow! Thank you very much!
(I actually wanted to thank via pushing the special button, but wasn't able to locate it so far)

Anatomy of a post: all those buttons and links, explained

I've seen "modeling marzipan" in the baking ingredient section of Coop quite a few times, often with a few colors available, as well as a big block of plain marzipan which I imagine can be colored and rolled out.

While I am pretty sure it won't be reusable like the playdough recipe Frederica kindly provided, I'm thinking it probably tastes a bit better and would be perfect for use for some kiddy kitchen fun day making (truly) edible figurines or something.

(Actually, here is a blog that provides a recipe for making modeling marzipan also, for those who may be interested.)

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The Joys of Opticianry

Yeah, but marzipan isn't edible. Almond .... bleccchhhhhh.