Easy “Hedgehog” Bread Rolls Recipe for Toddlers and Preschoolers

Baking bread is one of our favourite recipes to cook with toddlers and preschoolers. We started a tradition that every week we would bake some bread. For our Winter Animal Themed Week, you can use our easy bread recipe to create some delicious hibernating hedgehog bread rolls perfect to eat whilst you read our book of the week Over and Under the Snow by Kate Messner.

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Talking About Hibernation and Winter Animals with Preschoolers & Toddlers

Before starting we spent some time talking about Hedgehogs and hibernating animals in winter especially after reading our book of the week Over and Under the Snow by Kate Messner.

We talked about what they look like, what happens in the autumn to them and why they hibernate as well.

We have included affiliate links to some of the products and resources as an associate we may earn from qualifying purchases.

We have chosen to feature Over and Under the Snow by Kate Messner as our book of the week for our Winter Animals theme because of the beautiful illustrations and the wide variety of animals included in the store.

Find out more about why we love this book so much here!

Ingredients for Making Hedgehog Bread With Kids

• Strong White Bread Flour
• Quick Yeast (about half a packet)
• Sugar
• Salt
• Vegetable oil
• “Hand” hot water
• Raisins for decorating the hedgehog face

These are the basic ingredients for our Easy Bread Recipe to Cook with Kids.

Making Hedgehog Bread Rolls with Preschoolers

Bread is one of our favourite things to make with preschoolers and toddlers. Our easy bread recipe (link above) is great to make as it only needs to prove once and the bread tastes really nice.

Although we love making basic bread there are lots of other recipes you can try we’ve put our favourites together here – The Best Bread Recipes to Cook with Kids it, of course, contains our favourite pizza dough recipe as well.

This recipe is really simple to make, we’ve included our recipe card below so you can print it out and use it with your preschooler and toddler without having to have a screen nearby.

Top Tips for Making Bread with Toddlers and Preschoolers

Different factors affect the dough so it is useful to know a couple of these tips.

Bread Dough is too Sticky

This happens often especially with our older preschoolers that like to help to measure out the water and oil.

It’s easily fixed just add some more strong white bread flour a little at a time until it becomes less sticky.

The dough is Dry

Another common one and again due to measuring of the ingredients.

It’s solved by sprinkling a little more warm water over the dough and kneading it in until it’s not too dry and not too sticky.

The dough Isn’t Rising

This can be due to 3 things.

• The dough hasn’t been kneaded enough – give it some more kneading.
• It’s too cold – cover and place in a warmer room.
• The Yeast you have used it out of date – unfortunately this is a case of throwing away and buying some new Yeast.

Making the Bread Rolls Into Hedgehogs

This like our clay hedgehogs we shared recently is a great way to practice scissor skills and cutting with your toddlers and preschoolers.

Wash the scissor thoroughly beforehand and dry.

Then cut into the dough. As the dough has a different consistency than the clay it’s a good sensory experience as well.

As the hedgehogs rise during proving you may find the spikes disappear they may also disappear during cooking.

We’ve discovered that the best way to make the spikes stay visible is to cut after the proving with fairly deep cuts into the dough.

More Hibernating Animal Activities for Toddlers and Preschoolers

• Winter Art Project for Toddlers and Preschoolers – Where can you find the Winter Animals
• Bear Paw Name Game
• Hedgehog Clay Craft for Toddlers and Preschoolers