Fruit-Scented Play Dough
Homemade Play Dough is a staple in our home.
Nearly every week, we make a fresh batch and find new ways to play. So naturally, we sometimes get a bit bored and experiment with what we have in the kitchen!
Today, I wanted to share with you a 5 fruit-scented homemade play doughs that we created with only one plain batch of homemade play dough and ingredients we already had in our kitchen!
To start things off, we made a batch of our easy no-cook homemade play dough – here is a free printable for the recipe:
If homemade play dough is too intimidating or time-consuming, you can alternatively buy a natural play dough or buy commercial play dough and add your own scents, glitter, etc.
But I strongly encourage you to give homemade play dough a try — it is incredibly forgiving, cheap to make, and learning how to make a homemade play dough directly translates to success with other dough recipes – like making your own breads or homemade pizza with kids!
For each recipe provided below, I’ve tried to also provide a second way to make a similar play dough, in case what we had on hand is different than what you have at home.
There are several ways to play with your homemade fruit play dough, such as:
- smelling the doughs and guessing which fruit they smell like
- shaping the doughs to represent their fruits
- role playing “farmer’s market” and incorporating numbers for selling the fruit and early literacy skills in writing down orders or making signs for the fruit
- discussing healthy eating habits, or teaching kids to make their lunches
- any other play dough invitation – fruit-related or not! Check out our various play dough invitations for inspiration!
Homemade Banana Play Dough
As an alternative to our edible banana yogurt play dough, this banana-scented homemade play dough is made using banana extract and some natural yellow food colouring.
Homemade Grape Play Dough
This grape play dough is actually coloured using a Tablespoon of grape Jell-O powder! You can then still make the package of Jell-O by reducing the cold water needed in the recipe by 1/2 cup.
As an alternative, you can make our natural blueberry play dough, which comes out very purple. Just substitute out 1 cup of the water in the play dough recipe for 1 cup of blueberry juice (which can be made easily by boiling blueberries and straining them).
Homemade Lime Play Dough
This homemade lime play dough was made with a tablespoon of fresh lime juice (and I added two tablespoons of flour to even things out). Our natural green food dye doesn’t come out very dark, so we used green gel food colouring to dye the lime play dough.
Homemade Orange Play Dough
I love using a splash of orange blossom water in recipes, so I was excited to use it for this orange-scented homemade play dough. If you don’t have (or want to buy) orange blossom water, orange oil is a great replacement (and doubles as a sleep aid for kids). Orange juice will work in a pinch but I found it barely had a scent.
- Use 1 teaspoon of orange blossom water and a bit of orange food dye,
- or 1 tablespoon of orange juice, 2 tablespoons of flour and orange food dye,
- or orange oil and a bit of orange food dye.
Homemade Apple Play Dough
Our best homemade apple play dough recipe was made using cooked-down apple cider, but for this recipe we tried using some apple cider powder which had a much stronger smell. We used red gel food dye and took a bit of the lime play dough for the leaf.
(We also tried an apple candy flavor but I couldn’t smell the apple scent at all.)
Check out these other fun homemade play dough recipes from my fellow bloggers:
Inspiring Dragon Playdough Fun with Great Music | Witty Hoots
Sensory Fun With This Easy to Make Buttercup Playdough| Peakle Pie
Color Surprise Playdough | Frogs and Snails and Puppy Dog Tail
Fruit-Scented Play Dough | Sugar, Spice and Glitter
This looks great. I do a lot of craft stuff but have never actually made play dough before, I really must! x
Putting fruit scents is a great idea! It gives play dough an extra dimension of fun. Thanks for sharing at #ToddlerFunFriday
hi! how do you store it??
Hi Mariana,
I typically store in plastic, tupperware-style containers, however I haven’t experimented to see if glass containers (like mason jars) would be better. Anything air-tight will be a good bet, though. All of the play doughs can be stored at room temperature.