HOW TO MAKE SALT DOUGH: RECIPE AND IDEAS FOR DECORATING IT

Some days seem interminable: from rainy afternoons to cold winter months, up to the days of this very special period, marked by the Coronavirus emergency, which forces everyone to stay at home. Always staying at home is not easy, especially if you they have children, who need to be made aware of this strange and unprecedented situation. To keep them busy, there are many chores they can do that will help you keep them busy for a few hours. One of the best ideas is to prepare and make objects with the salt dough.

In fact, the dough is simple and quick to obtain and you can create all kinds of crafts, to be colored and decorated by indulging your imagination. Not surprisingly, salt dough is loved not only by children, but also by adults. In this article, you will find the recipe, with doses and ingredients, cooking times, how to store it and many ideas for crafts. Often, the best way to keep children busy is to let them play with their creativity:

The salt dough recipe

Easy, quick and economical: the preparation of the salt dough will only take 10 minutes of your time. To make this recipe, you will need these ingredients:

2 glasses of flour
1 glass of fine salt
1 glass of warm water

Once the ingredients have been prepared, the steps to follow are very simple:
1. Take a bowl or a salad bowl and pour in the flour and salt.
2. Mix by kneading with your hands or turning everything with a wooden spoon.
3. Add the water.
4. Knead to obtain a homogeneous, compact and soft dough, which does not stick to the fingers.

If the dough is too soft and sticky, add a little more flour and mix it all together. Instead, if the dough is too dry and crumbly, add some water and mix everything well.

Make the colored salt dough

It is possible to color the salt dough after cooking, but some mothers with their children prefer to make it directly colored. In this case, several solutions are possible. Starting from the mixture obtained by mixing flour, salt and water, take a part of the dough and put it in a mold. Once this operation is repeated with the rest of the dough, you will have many molds to color in different ways.
To do this, you can add food coloring: if you choose to mix them with your fingers, be careful to wash your hands immediately after, because the colors tend to stick to the skin and dirty your clothes!

Another solution is to color the pasta with the spices used in the kitchen.
With saffron, you will get a yellow paste.
With the paprika, you will have an orange paste.
With the chilli, you will get a red paste.

If the children want only one color of salt paste, just add the liquid food coloring to the water in the second phase of the dough or mix the dyes or spices with the flour and salt in the first step of the recipe.

One last tip: you can perfume the pasta with a drop of essential oil, with spices (like cinnamon, perfect for Christmas, or anise) or with vanilla extract, coffee and much more!

Making creations and crafts with salt dough

Once you have obtained the dough, neutral or colored, prepare a dry surface, on which you can spread some baking paper to make the children's work easier. To create objects with salt dough you can indulge yourself with your imagination, helping yourself with various accessories: forks, spoons, cookie cutters, rolling pin and many other kitchen utensils.
There is really no limit to the jobs that can be done and the most beautiful can also become original gifts for Father's Day or Mother's Day, or even decorations for the home. Hearts, bunnies, small plants: children will literally lose their knowledge of time!

Cooking the salt dough

It is important to leave the crafts created with the salt dough to dry for at least 12 hours before cooking them. For larger objects you can wait up to a maximum of 48 hours: in this case, pay attention to the impatience of the children! The longer the rest time to dry the pasta, the shorter the cooking time in the oven. reducing the risk of cracks or other small damage, just like with clay. So, just like in the recipe, it is good to keep in mind these simple steps for cooking the dough:

The longer the drying time, the shorter the cooking time.
Baking a large and often salt dough object lengthens the cooking time.
The softer the salt dough, the longer the cooking time.
Baking temperature in the oven: between 75 ° C and 110 ° C.
Standard cooking time for small jobs: 2 hours.
Check from time to time to check the temperature and avoid cracks.

Before putting the various objects in the oven, you can brush them with beaten egg so that they take on a golden hue during cooking.

Decorate the salt dough

Once the objects are cooked, you can decorate them with the help of:

Grains and grains: lentils, pepper, cumin, poppy seeds, corn, cloves, anise, etc ...
Sand
Flowers and leaves
Pearls, buttons, sequins and sequins.

It will be sufficient to attach them to the object with vinyl glue.

In addition, it is possible to paint the salt dough with tempera and watercolors. The important thing is that both are diluted but not excessively. Finally, once the color has been applied and left to dry, we recommend applying a thin layer of transparent varnish to fix the pigment, to prevent it from lightening over time.

Keep the salt dough

If you have some of the dough left over, make a ball and wrap it in a cloth. Put everything in a plastic bag and then place it in the refrigerator. In this way, the salt dough will keep for about a week. remove it from the fridge at least half an hour before you want to start modeling it, so that it softens.

As for the jobs made with pasta, the important thing is that they are kept in dry environments. In fact, humidity is the worst enemy of this type of material.