I don’t have a lot of jewellery, nor silvery for that matter. The silver stuff seems to go dull and tarnished the minute you remove it from its tissue paper. But … I’ve started wearing my silver stuff more often, now that I know an easy method of cleaning it. Easy as can be: just drop it in this mixture, swirl it about a bit, rinse and dry. I first saw this method on telly – that programme with those house cleaning, maniacal woman who invade people’s houses.
Ingredients
- 1 tablespoon salt
- 1 tablespoon baking soda
- 1 tablespoon dish detergent
- 1 cup hot but not boiling water
- 1 piece aluminium foil
Directions:(wear gloves or use tweezers)
- Heat water in the microwave until hot but not boiling.
- Cut a piece of aluminium foil that roughly covers the bottom of a small cereal bowl.
- Pour hot water into the bowl, then the salt, soda, and dishwashing liquid. Stir. Place jewellery on top of foil and let it sit for 5 to 10 minutes.
- Rinse jewellery in cool water and dry jewellery completely with soft cloth.
- Discard the solution after use and make a new batch for the next piece of jewellery.
- This works well for silver, gold, brass, and nickled silver.
The Chalk Hills Kitchen 
This is well timed for me, as i have several expensive pairs of earrings that have started looking quite dull.
Thank you! Will be trying this mixture today!
Thanks for stopping by for a read, and I hope you find it as remarkable as I do everytime I use this mehtod. 🙂
Excellent – will give it a try. What does the tinfoil do though? I don’t think it would have a reaction with the other ingredients, or would it?
🙂 Mandy
It’s an electrochemical process. The soda and salt lift the sulphur (tarnish) from the silver, and since the sulphur is more attracted to aluminium than silver, it adheres to the foil instead of the silver. Nifty, eh?
COOL! Thanks. 🙂
No probs. 🙂
Oooh, that’s a great tip Misky, thank you! I didn’t know you could do that. I used to make silver jewellery, so I have a bit of a collection that often needs polishing!
Just lay each piece on the foil, and let the chemicals do their work for you. If they’re really tarnished heavily, you might need to do it twice. I have some old silver that tarnishes if you smile at it – this works for it.
I just tried this and it WORKS! It’s non toxic too. Thank you so much for the tip! Hugs to you and Mr. Misky
Brilliant! Hugs back to you!! 🙂
I’ve never tried this on silver jewelry, but I will. I’ve done something similar with a large quantity in my kitchen sink for large silver serving pieces (that almost never see daylight these days!). A word of caution, though; if your flat silver has an intricate pattern, this solution may lift more of the tarnish than you would like and rob the silver of some of its “antique-y” charm. Thanks, Misky!
Very good point. My father polished up his coin collection many years ago, which shaved a hefty value off its valuation. It seems that antiques require a bit of oxidation!
I’ve always heard toothpaste works. I’ll have to try your version! Thanks for the tip.
I think toothpaste would work as an abrasive whereas the foil-soda-soda method is electrochemical based – it’s science. 🙂
Yes, I think you must be right. And my son loves science, so we could call it an experiment. 😉
Ooh, great tip! Co-incidentally I silver-dipped (commercial stuff) a lot of my tarnished earrings a couple of days ago and when I mentioned it to colleagues most of them didn’t have a clue what I meant – and I work in a science environment! We always had silver dip in the house when I was little. Not often used, but magic for a small child to watch.
It’s great science fun for kids, particularly because it results in something shiny and sparkly! Super fun! 😀
I put it on my FB page — thank you for the hint!! Have a blessed remainder of the weekend!!
Blessings to you, too, Becca, and thank you for your continued support. 🙂