How to make single servings of doll foods...

        Contrary to popular child opinions at YouTube, Americans do eat a varied diet of many healthy foods for breakfast, lunch and dinner! Below, I will share just a few of our 'single servings' for AG doll play dinners. Single servings may be individually plated on your dolly's favorite china, along with an entree. In other words, mixed and matched according to whatever she or he feels like pretending to eat at the moment.
       The collection of 18" dolly single side servings on this post includes: glazed carrots, pickled red beets, sautéed mushrooms, steamed green beans, asparagus with Hollandaise sauce, Brussels sprouts in dill sauce, avocado and tomato salad, pan-fried cinnamon apples, tater tots, steamed broccoli, mashed potatoes with brown gravy, bird's nests (peas served inside mashed potatoes), sliced melons, apple sauce, and apricots or tomatoes and pineapple served with cottage cheese, stuffed celery sticks and carrot and raisin salad. All of these sides are common to our family's dinner menus and may be eaten with a variety of entrees any night of the week.

Above is our first collection of hand-sculpted, hand-painted foods made
for individual plating.

Asparagus with Hollandaise sauce, Brussels sprouts in dill
 sauce, pan-fried apples, tomato and okra, green beans
and sliced sweet and sour beets.

Center, are the baked turkey legs. To see the entire 
Thanksgiving turkey go here.

 

       Dinner in the U.S. is served on average to families with young children at approximately 6:30 to 7:00 in the evening. After our children entered college, our family dinners returned to being served later in the evening. I will share single servings (crafts) for lunch and breakfast on future posts.
       The following single servings are made from oven-bake clay. I encourage parents here to introduce their young ones to simple sculpting techniques as these are easily achieved for little pocket change. By the time a child is in fourth grade, he or she should have the small motor skills needed to roll out simple shapes: spheres, snakes, cubes etc.. and stick these together gently in order to achieve the following food crafts successfully.

 

In the center are cheese burgers including sliced tomatoes
and lettuce between buns.

In the center is steamed broccoli made using both Sculpey
and hot glue. The stems are first sculpted and baked. Then
the tops are formed using hot glue. While the glue is still
warm the tops are rolled into beads. After cooling down
the broccoli is then painted green.

Tips for Crafting Doll Sized Foods:

• Paste small cardboard rounds to the bottom of each single serving in order to give the tiny foods strength to survive play!
• Use inexpensive acrylics from a hobby store to paint the single servings in 'life-like' colors. Seal the projects with Mod Podge after the paint has dried.
• Alternative craft materials like: paper pulp, mini foam balls, beads, hot glue and string can also be used to make tiny foods as well.
• If you are unsure about how large or how small you would like a serving to be, simply look at the real food on your plate at night for the answers. Hold your own hand up next to the plated food and compare the size of your hand to the food size. Now compare the size of the sculpted food with your doll's hand. Does the size seem similar to your own?
• Collect small tools to make marks into your food crafts: things like a toothpick or a plastic knife.
• Collect very tiny paint brushes to color your food with.
  
• Use objects to print textures into the mini foods too like: a comb, things with rippled edges, sandpaper and interesting rocks.
  

 

Salmon fillets, Salmon steak, tomato, olive and
avocado salad.

Fruits for dinner: musk melon, tomatoes cottage cheese,
apricots and cottage cheese, honeydew melon and
cottage cheese, celery stuffed with cheese spreads,
carrot and raisin salad, slice of watermelon,
avocado and tomato salad.

Stewed prunes and baked acorn squash.

Sweet Potatoes, peas, glazed carrots, corn, yams,
stewed prunes, sliced beats and sautéed mushrooms.

Mashed potatoes and peas or "Bird's Nests." made
using paper pulp and Styrofoam beads.

 

Meatloaf sliced with tomato sauce. These were made
using paper pulp, dried and then painted with acrylics.
The glazed tomato sauce was painting using puff paints.

 

In the lower left corner is a canned peach slice.
In the center are tomatoes stuffed with tuna salad.
In the lower right corner is stewed tomatoes and okra.

Pineapple and cottage cheese, corn bread, applesauce
avocado and tomato, and macaroni and cheese.