Home Remedies For Cleaning Tarnished Silver

Silver often loses its original shine, and therefore it needs to be cleaned. This is especially true if it is worn often, and when worn for long periods it will turn less shiny and will darken in color.

As far as commercial products used to clean tarnished silver, you can find quite a few commercial products on the market that could serve this purpose. However, it also is possible to find a variety of household products that can be used for the cleaning of tarnished silver.

Common Methods

You might run across numerous ways to shine up tarnished silver. One involves the use of vinegar, baking soda, water, and aluminum foil. In some cases, just the baking soda and water is used.

You can boil the water and add the baking soda and salt to it. Afterwards, you then pour it over the silver spoons in order to transfer the tarnish stains from the spoons to the aluminum foil. This tarnish removal occurs as a certain chemical reaction takes place.

Additional Cleaning Methods

Additional methods are often used to clean silver pieces. These are further explained in the next few sections. Read these very carefully so you can choose the method that is best for you.

The toothpaste method-Find a bowl to put your silver in. Then, pour a mixture of sour milk and buttermilk over the top of the pieces. Then, allow your silver pieces to soak overnight and then the next day you should rinse off each item with some water and then pat each one dry with a clean cloth.

The whole milk method-You can mix whole milk, cream of tartar, and lemon juice (alterative would be vinegar) together. Mix these tarnish-removal ingredients together and then use this to clean off your precious and valuable metal pieces.

The baking soda paste method-First, line a plastic or glass pan with aluminum foil, as you have done before. Then, lay the silver pieces in the aluminum, as each item should be touching the foil in order to complete the chemical reaction and tarnish transfer.

Then, boil a gallon of water and add one cup of baking soda to it. You might want to use the baking soda and water solution over the sink as it could fizz up in a way that makes a huge mess.

Additional Guidance

You may be required to repeat one of the above processes several times if your silver items are badly tarnished. You can keep doing these steps until the tarnish is completely removed from your precious spoons, forks, knives, dishes, and jewelry.

If you want to leave your pieces soak for awhile you can. This will help further with the removal of the tarnish from each silver and silver-coated item you own.

If you want to be certain that one of the above solutions will not damage your silver items you can test it. Perhaps you can even purchase a cheap test spoon or fork at a thrift store to see how this tarnish removal process will work out for you.