With my daughter now in school, I have to really worry about food in her classroom that is not safe for her to eat. For the first time in her life, she will be surrounded by lunches filled with gluten and will be on her own to make the right choice not to do the trade-your-lunch-with-friends thing many kids do. It’s not only the food I have to worry about but also the products in their classroom – like traditional, store-bought playdough.
There really is no way that you can walk into a kindergarten classroom and not find playdough – it’s a traditional play and education tool for that age group. There are a few gluten-free brands of playdough that you can purchase but seeing how much kids go through it can become quite costly. I recently tested out my own recipe for gluten-free playdough that took under 10 minutes and being able to make multiple batches in different colors was a selling factor for me.
Gluten-Free Playdough Recipe
Ingredients:
- 1 cup of water
- 1/2 cup of corn OR potato starch
- 1/2 cup white rice flour
- 1/2 cup of table salt
- 2 teaspoons cream of tartar
- 1 teaspoon vegetable oil
Directions:
In a large mixing bowl mix together all ingredients. Add to pot over medium heat and stir together until the mix turns into a well-formed ball. Remove from heat (optional separate into sections and add different food colors to each ball). Store in air-tight containers when completely cooled.
Thanks so much for sharing this, Devan! It’s a great reminder to folks as some forget about the gluten factor when it comes to play-dough. Off to share on Facebook, etc.
Hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving! Hey, they need to update the sidebar here so you show up as one of the authors. 🙂
Shirley
Thanks Shirley – it can be hard for the newly diagnosed especially to remember all the other non-food related issues with gluten. Hope you had a great Thanksgiving (I’m Canadian & we celebrate in October). xxo
Sure, Devan! First, I wanted you to know that when I shared this recipe on Facebook, one of my readers who had never had success with gluten-free play dough before immediately made your recipe and left a comment that it worked wonderfully! 🙂 Second, I knew you were in Canada and I’m envious of you gals with your Oct. Thanksgiving. While it’s my favorite holiday, I don’t like the fact that it immediately kicks off the pressure of the holidays. October would be better. ;-)’
And, that said, have a wonderful holiday season!
Shirley
Thank you for these ideas!! My son is allergic to wheat as well as (I strongly suspect) Celiac! He’s in Kindergarten and I didn’t think about playdough (even though it’s not allowed in our house) being a problem until I saw the teacher set out the play dough centre for another child and I connected it to my son’s bad hand rash & swollen fingers. I appreciate you sharing your knowledge with the rest of us!