Tickle-Me-Pink Cookies Sensory Recipe

Celebrate Valentine’s Day by making these easy, strawberry-flavored cookies with just three ingredients
Instead of rolling dough and cutting out heart-shaped cookies, try these strawberry-flavored cookies made with just three ingredients! The secret to this recipe is a strawberry cake mix, which you combine with vegetable oil and two eggs. While the cookies are baking, your kitchen will smell like strawberries. The cookies turn out soft, puffy, and very pink!

Utensils

  • One or two baking sheets
  • Parchment paper or a silicone baking mat
  • Large mixing bowl
  • Measuring cup
  • Mixing spoon or spatula

Ingredients

  • 15.25-oz. box strawberry cake mix, such as Pillsbury
  • ½ scant cup vegetable oil
  • 2 large eggs

Recipe Steps & Suggested Sensory Directions

Step 1.
Gather the ingredients and utensils. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.
  • TOUCH. What do the utensils feel like? Are their textures rough, smooth, or shiny?
  • LISTEN. When you tap the baking sheet with your fingers or the spatula, does it make a sound?
  • LISTEN. Listen for the “beep” when your oven is ready.
  • TOUCH. The oven is hot!
Step 2.
Line the baking sheet with a silicone mat or parchment paper.
  • SEE. When you put the parchment paper on a shiny baking sheet, there’s no reflection anymore. Hold a piece of parchment paper up to your eyes. This is what some children who are visually impaired might see.
  • TOUCH. When you’re not baking cookies, you can make a sensory toy for your child by attaching Mardi Gras beads, ribbons, or small kitchen utensils to a shiny baking sheet or tray. It’s a toy with color, sound, and texture!
Step 3.
Open the cake mix and pour it into the mixing bowl.
  • SMELL. Hmm, the cake mix smells like strawberries! What else in your refrigerator has a strawberry smell? The strawberry jam on your sandwich, strawberry yogurt, or a fresh cut strawberry to snack on?
  • SEE. The cake mix is pink. Even if your child can’t see colors, it’s important they begin to understand the concept of colors. Point out other items in your home that are pink. Maybe your child has a favorite pink toy, stuffed animal, or purse!
  • TOUCH. If some of the cake mix spills on your work surface, help your child trace some shapes with their fingertips as you talk about the soft, powdery texture. You can also put a little bit of cake mix on their feeding tray.
Step 4.
Add the eggs and oil to the cake mix in the mixing bowl and combine the ingredients until blended.
  • LISTEN. Count the eggs out loud as you crack them into the bowl. “One… two. Now there are four eggshells!”
  • LISTEN. Use narration as you describe how the ingredients come together while you stir. Action verbs like “stir,” “mix,” and “fold” make the activity come alive, along with adjectives that describe the texture of the batter. “This cookie batter is getting stiff! It’s hard to stir. Look how pink it is! It reminds me of bubble gum.”
  • TOUCH. Using hand under hand, encourage your child to hop on top of your hand while you mix the batter. Or put a scoop of batter into a smaller bowl and let your child stir on their own!
Step 5.
The dough will be sticky. Refrigerate it for 15-20 minutes so it will be easier to scoop out of the bowl.
  • TOUCH. While you wait for the dough to chill, make a texture book about hearts, play in a Valentine’s Day sensory bin, or read your Valentine’s Day cards. HERE are some ideas!
Step 6.
Once it’s chilled, drop the dough in rounded tablespoons on your baking sheet, about two inches apart.
  • LISTEN. Use verbal descriptions to explain how you’re putting the dough on the cookie sheet with action verbs like “scoop” and “drop” or silly words like “plop!,” and then “scrape” the bowl clean with a spatula.
  • TOUCH. Encourage your child to try putting a spoon into the batter and dropping some dough on the baking sheet. Baking helps develop fine motor skills as your child learns to grasp the spoon, put it into the mixing bowl, scoop out the dough, and drop the dough on the baking sheet. Help them scrape the dough off the spoon with another spoon or your fingers.
  • LISTEN. Count out loud how many spoonfuls of dough are on your cookie sheet. How many can you fit on your cookie sheet? “We made 12 cookies, but there’s no more room! Let’s get another cookie sheet ready to bake more cookies!”
  • TOUCH. The dough sticks to your spoon and the bowl. Maybe your child would like to touch the dough with their hands or feet. If your child is sensitive to textures, put some dough in a plastic sandwich bag and let your child smoosh the dough or pat it to make a pink pancake.
Step 7.
Bake the cookies for 9 minutes but don’t let them brown. Remove the cookie sheet from the oven and let the cookies cool before transferring them to a rack.
  • TOUCH. Finish making your texture book about hearts, playing in your Valentine’s Day sensory bin, or reading your Valentine’s Day cards while you wait for the cookies to bake.
  • LISTEN. Listen for the beep of the timer.
  • SMELL. Can you smell the strawberries in your kitchen now?
  • SEE. Take a peek at your cookies. Don’t let them brown!
  • TOUCH. The cookies turned from ball shapes to circle shapes!
Step 8.
When the cookies have cooled, you can dip them in melted white chocolate chips or spread vanilla frosting on them. Add red sprinkles or heart candies.
  • SEE. While you enjoy a cookie notice how the pink color pops on any colored surface.
  • TOUCH. Use a small spreader or popsicle stick to frost the cookies or serve them plain.
  • TASTE. The cookies taste very sweet. Share one with your “sweetie” on Valentine’s Day!
Recipe and photo courtesy of I Heart Naptime

A Shared Vision: Partners in Pediatric Blindness & Visual Impairment

EIN 81-4227664