Salt Dough
Salt dough is a great material for making basic sculptures and three-dimensional craft projects. It is an all-natural alternative to commercial play dough and homemade air dry clay. Your finished salt dough sculptures can either be air-dried or oven-dried to set.
Featured Crafts
Supplies Needed
- All-purpose flour
- Table salt
- Spoons or spatulas
- Measuring cups
- Small basin or large bowl
- Food coloring or tempera paint (optional)
STEPS
1Measure out the flour and salt.
In a basin or large bowl, measure out two cups all-purpose flour and 1 cup table salt.
2Mix them together.
Mix the two ingredients well.
3Add water.
The amount of water needed is about ½ to ¾ cup. I usually start out with ½ cup and add a bit more in the next step.
4Knead the dough.
Mix and knead the dough. The resulting dough should be firm and workable. Add a bit more water if the dough is too tough or dry.
5Add color.
Divide your dough into several sections to make various colors of dough. Take one of the dough sections, add several drops of food coloring or a small dollop of tempera or poster paint. For an all-natural colored dough, you can use food ingredients like coffee, curry or annatto.
6Mix well.
Continue kneading until the dough is uniformly colored.
7Make several colors of dough.
Make several colors of salt dough. You can make them a few days before using them. Store them wrapped in plastic wrap and then in a zipper plastic bag inside the refrigerator. Before using them, make sure they are back to room temperature. If they are a bit dry, just add a bit of water and knead.
8Use the dough for crafts.
Use the salt dough as you would sculpt play dough. The great thing about it is that the salt dough sculptures will harden if you leave them out to dry at room temperature. Depending on the size of the pieces, it will take 2 to 7 days to dry completely. Turn the pieces from time to time for faster drying.
9Oven dry the salt dough pieces.
Instead of air drying the uncolored salt dough pieces, you can bake them in a conventional oven at 200°F (93°C). The drying time depends on the thickness and size of the pieces. It can be as short as 30 minutes for small and flat pieces to several hours for bigger, thicker ones. To avoid browning, check on the pieces from time to time. You can also cover them loosely with aluminum foil.
Once done baking, allow the pieces to cool. Paint with tempera or acrylic paint. After the paint dries, seal in with a coat of polyurethane spray.
