Structurally well-defined assemblies of silver nanoparticles, including the dendritic nano-flowers (NFs), planar nano-spheres (NSs) and nano-dendrites (NDs) were obtained by a surfactant-free and ultrafast (approximate to 15 min) self-assembly process on as-purchased carbon-coated copper TEM grids. The silver nano-assemblies, especially the NFs modified TEM grids, when serving as surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) substrates for detecting melamine molecules, demonstrated a long-lived limit of detection (LOD) of as low as 10(-11) M, suggesting the potential of these silver-assemblies modified carbon-coated copper grids as novel potable and cost-effective SERS substrates for trace detection toward various food contaminants like melamine. (C) 2016 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.