Seven cool uses for inexpensive salt
June 6, 2009 by Jennifer Chait
Filed under Crafty Solutions
Salt is one of the cheapest items I can think of. You can get so much at the store for under a buck and besides cooking you can use it for tons o’ cool things.
- Make a homemade salt body scrub – you can make a basic salt scrub by just mixing salt and water into a paste or you can get fancy and add fresh herbs, essential oils, or olive oil to make a more luxurious, but still cheap compared to boutique, type scrub. See a recipe for sugar scrub – you can use salt instead of the sugar.
- Fix your gunky sticky iron by sprinkling a bit of salt onto a piece of brown paper (like a grocery bag) and run the iron over it.
- Put a bunch of ice cubes in your coffee pot, add a good shake of salt, swirl the salt and ice for a nice clean pot.
- Clean your greens – take a big bowl and fill it water, add some salt, add your greens (kale, spinach, lettuce) and swirl in the bowl. The salt scrubs off the dirt. Just remember to rinse your greens after.
- Sprinkle right away on still hot spills inside your oven. Wait for the oven to cool and use a damp cloth to clean the spill, it’ll come right up.
- Get rid of watermarks on wood – make a little paste of salt + some cooking oil, rub the paste slowly into the watermark (like a cup ring on wood), allow it to sit a few minutes then wipe with soft cloth.
- Toss over your shoulder to ward off evil – JUST KIDDING. Just making sure you’re still awake
Do you have any other cool uses for salt? Share in the comments.
[image via stock.xchang]
Just a quick note on home made salt/sugar scrubs – they cause micro scratches on the skin, which usually make matters worse.
Great ideas! I think I will try the wood water ring trick and let you know how it goes.
Hey everyone, for an inexpensive face scrub, I mix sugar with babywash. The babywash is hypoallerginic, so I don’t break out from it and the sugar really sloughs off dead skin.
The Kitchn says you can use salt to chill wine quickly:
http://www.thekitchn.com/thekitchn/tips-techniques/tip-chill-wine-quickly-with-salt-085805
One gallon of white vinegar + one pound (or close to it) of salt + couple drops of liquid dish soap = very effective weed killer. Just pour it right on your weeds, wait a day or two and then pull up the dead weeds.
Warning: don’t use this mixture near other plants that you’d like to keep alive. It’s best for using on weeds that grow up in cracks in the sidewalk.