Uses for Green Foam Produce Trays

I buy a lot of reduced bananas to make banana bread, so I end up with a lot of those green foam produce trays that many stores still use when they are making convenience packs of fruits and veggies to sell. I felt bad that my local waste facility wouldn’t recycle them, so I started brainstorming uses. Here are a few of the ideas I came up with:

Photo: K Thomas

• Stamp carving – This is the easiest stamp carving medium ever. All you need to “carve” your image is a ball point pen! (Remember to reverse any letters you carve since they will be backwards in the stamped image if you don’t.)
• Paint palette – The foam tray doesn’t absorb acrylics, which makes it the perfect choice for a disposable palette.
• Cookie tray – If you like to give away some of the goodies you cook, then you’ll be pleased to know that these trays are a great way to keep cookies from crumbling. My grandma uses them to send home cookies with anyone who visits.

I still have quite a stack of foam trays sitting here, though. If you have a great way to use them, I’d love to hear it!