Christiana Aretta writes a journal about food, photography, & toys.

I’ve been involved with the planning of Social Justice Camp DC for the past couple of the months. Last week, we had our planning meeting at my house, complete with meat and vegetarian chilis, mixed greens, and spiced apple crumble. And about a billion varieties of chips.

Note to self: If you’re going to invite people to a potluck involving chili, be sure to delegate the bringing of chips to one person and one person alone. Otherwise, be prepared to horribly torn between the fatty salty goodness of Fritos and the light crispy goodness of Xochitl.

This meeting was extra fun for 2 reasons: 1. It was at my house. 2. We made playdough.

Or, to be accurate, our fearless leader Kelli Shewmaker made playdough. She had the sneaky idea that playing with playdough would free our subconscious creativity during our planning discussion. And boy was she right! While we made bees, flowers, tiny vegetables, sheep, and things disturbingly shaped like human organs, we had really productive conversations about event scheduling, venue, attendees, website, eventbrite, ticketing, meals, etc. I think we even impressed our newest member who was attending her very first meeting and decided to come again (although it could have just been the excellent food).

Ingredients

• 1 cup flour
• 1/2 cup salt
• 1 cup water
• 2 tablespoons oil
• 2 tablespoons cream of tartar
• food coloring

Preparation

Mix flour, salt and oil in a saucepan on the stove, and slowly add the water. Cook over low heat, stirring until dough becomes stiff. Remove to a plate or wax paper and let cool to a temperature where you can handle it easily. Knead the playdough to desired consistency. Use as is, or divide into balls and add food coloring. Playdough remains pliable for about a day in open air. After a day, it begins to harden and will be completely hardened in 2-3 days.

Preparation Note: Do NOT make playdough shortly before a job interview, fancy dinner party, or anywhere else you might be embarrassed by technicolor rainbow hands. The more deeply you work the dye into the dough, the more deeply it gets worked into your skin.

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