Food colouring for children's crafts

[Peregrin]

So the wisdom of Mumsnet seems to be that supermarket food colouring is rubbish for baking, and stuff like Wilton and Sugarflair give much stronger colours.

Has anyone used these in children's crafts? Could they be used, for example, for making body paint that washes off, or paint that a toddler could use in finger painting onto cardboard that dries in a stable way, or home-made modelling clay that does not stain little hands and clothes?

I think food dye stains really badly, so although I use it for playdoh, I generally end up with blue fingers.
So I'd be very careful using it as a stain free colorant for kids!

Nooooo! I too have ended up with stained fingers from making playdough!

Actually, once the playdough is made it doesn't stain so you could make dough with it.

Thank you addicted and Capone. Does that go for all brands / which one have you tried and found ok?

Or is there another, child-safe paint or stain that works better?

Best use for crap liquid food colouring is dying rice.

Cheapest, grotty economy rice in a jam jar, few drops of food colour, shake.

The resulting rice is superb for making pictures. It's light, it colourful and it stays put with ordinary PVA, which heavier chick peas etc. don't.

Rice absorbs the colour so it's not very messy.

Coloured rice is great in a tray for "water play" without actual water. It pours from cups and goes through funnels etc.

Very faded, because it's about 12 years old.

Very faded, because it's about 12 years old.

Sorry, There should be a picture, but MN is being odd

Last try

Thanks for the idea, Elephants and Capone! It's going on my list of things to try. Very pretty picture :)