- Make a Funnel – Curl a section of foil into a cone shape, secure it with tape, and start pouring.
- Shine Silver – Line a glass pan with foil, add several spoonfuls of baking soda, fill the pan with boiling water, and drop in tarnished silverware for a quick cleaning.
- Keep matches dry – Wrap your matches in aluminum foil to keep them from getting damp or wet on camping trips.
- Make a light reflector – Perfect when photographing food, still life or portraits. Cut a sturdy cardboard box (can be as large or small as you like), cover cardboard with aluminum foil and voila, an excellent and inexpensive light reflector.
- Shield a Muffin Tin from Grease and Burned on batter – Cut a piece of foil slightly larger than the muffin pan. Lie the foil on the pan, pressing down slightly. Snip an X over each opening and place a paper liner in each cup.
- Re-attach a loose vinyl tile – Place a sheet of foil over a loose self-stick vinyl tile, and press a hot iron over the foil until the adhesive backing melts and sticks to the sub-floor.
- Protect knobs & hardware – Wrap doorknobs and hardware with foil to protect them from splatters when painting.
- Television and DVD player stacked on top of each other? If your picture quality seems to have static, place a piece of aluminum foil between the two electronics. They both put off electromagnetic fields that might interfere with each other; the foil will block the transfer between them.
- Make a tray – I have done this a couple of times to accommodate large birthday cakes that I have made. All you need to do is
cover a piece of doubled cardboard (tape cardboard together to secure) or a wooden board with aluminum foil. - Sharpen Scissors – Fold a sheet of foil several times and cut through it with a pair of dull scissors to sharpen the blades.
- Clean barbecue racks – Ball up a square of foil, and use it to scrub off black bits.
- Protect tree trunks – Moles, rabbits, mice and other small animals will often feed on the bark of young trees during the winter. An effective deterrent is to wrap the tree trunks with a double layer of heavy-duty aluminum foil in late fall. Make sure you remove the foil in spring.
- Keep pie crusts from burning – I do this all the time. If your crust is becoming too brown and the filling is still not baked, slip a piece of aluminum foil over the pie to prevent further browning.
- Make a reflector oven when camping – This looks very cool and I’m going to try this on our next camping trip! You can find instructions the web.
- Create special-shaped cake pans – Using a double thickness of aluminum foil, form the foil into whatever shape you want; heart, star, tree or whatever. For support, set formed pan inside a square, round or rectangular pan to bake.
UPDATE – I’m adding another tip that I was reminded of from one of website visitors. A reader told me she wraps carrots in foil to keep them fresh longer…for years we have wrapped celery in foil before putting it in the crisper; it lasts for up to two weeks!