Healthy Kitchen Hacks is a bi-weekly series on Teaspoon of Spice. We share fellow bloggers’ and our own favorite cooking shortcuts, kitchen tricks and “aha” ideas for making healthy meals and healthy living a snap.
{Love hacks? Check out our previous Healthy Kitchen Hacks posts for tons of shortcuts!}
If you are like me, you’ll find any excuse not to clean.
Don’t get me wrong – I like things to be clean, neat and orderly but I selfishly don’t want to spend more than 10 minutes hours doing it. (I guess some people feel the same way about cooking while I could spend hours in the kitchen.)
But I can’t complain too much as one of my top marriage perks is that the husband does all the dishes and vacuums regularly.
Still, these spring cleaning tricks are right up my alley – simple cleaning hacks to keeping a healthy kitchen (though you wouldn’t find me doing all of these in the same day – ha.)
1) 3 Easy Ways To Naturally Clean Your Garbage Disposal
via Jill @ThePrairieHomestead
I like this post from Jill because I routinely use all three ways she shows how to naturally clean your garbage disposal. I use the citrus trick just about any time I’m cutting lemons (though I have to psyche myself up to stick my hand down the disposal to retrieve the pulverized rind. Anyone else have that irrational fear that the disposal will somehow turn on with your hand in it?? GAH.)
2) How To Clean Your Grill With An Onion
via Holley @HolleyGrainger
Talk about an all-natural cleaning. Onion + vinegar or lemon juice + tongs + a little elbow grease is all you need get that grill cleaned up. Holley explains how easily it’s done in her Use Onions To Clean Your Grill post.
(Bonus: Turns out that that onion also makes your grill nonstick according to Cindy @ Skip To My Lou. Score!)
3) DIY Fruit & Vegetable Wash
Jo-Anna @APrettyLife
Admittedly, I have never bought any of those produce wash products but I was intrigued by Jo-Anna’s Homemade Fruit & Veggie Wash hack, especially because in general, these washes can help prevent browning and keep more delicate fruit – like berries – fresher longer.
4) Clean Your Pan BEFORE Taking It Off The Stove
via Faith @TheKitchn
The least favorite part of cooking: cleaning up that pan with burnt food stuck to it. But to avoid the steel wool and extra elbow grease, Faith shares how to make this type of clean up a snap by putting the pan back on the stove to clean it (after you removed your meal from the pan first, of course.)
5) Use Tea Bags To Clean Your Dishes
via @SuperHealthyKids & @TheSavingsExperiment
Ok, so, you didn’t have the time to degrease your pan on the stove via the above tip in your rush to get dinner on the table. So, now you have a sink full of gunky pots and dirty dishes.
Tea bags to the rescue! This video from The Savings Experiment shows how tea bags can help clean up those dishes. (Bonus: watch the entire 2 minute video for more practical uses for tea bags in your home.)
Would you try any of these hacks? Any healthy kitchen or healthy living shortcuts to share? Shoot us an email ([email protected] or [email protected]) or share below and we’ll try them out.
Jay
Friday 27th of May 2016
This got to be the first time I see a tip about cleaning your bbq with onion.. vinegar and baking soda yes, but onion.. it is definitely original. I'm a bit skeptical about this but I will definitely give it a try.
Sarah Anderson
Friday 1st of April 2016
I haven't heard of using an onion to clean a grill before. Next time I use the grill I need to try this out. Are there any other kitchen appliances that this works with? That would be cool to be able to clean your oven or stove this way too.
Deanna Segrave-Daly
Saturday 2nd of April 2016
I can't say I've tried this on any other kitchen appliances but now you have me thinking.... :)
Phillius Thomas
Friday 18th of December 2015
That is interesting that you would say to clean your pan before taking it off the stove. I have not heard or thought to do this before, but the reasoning is quite sound. Next time I cook on the stove, I would love to see how it works out!
Jodi Barber
Tuesday 17th of November 2015
I also don't like to spend much time cleaning and this is why I like to wash as I go and use cleaning hacks that help me to prevent the need of more cleaning later! I am happy to find these hacks and I am sure that they will come very useful for me! :) Thank you for sharing!
Deanna Segrave-Daly
Tuesday 17th of November 2015
Thanks for your comments - while most of our hacks are cooking related, we love to throw in some kitchen cleaning shortcuts when we use them!
Gail Stokes
Monday 31st of August 2015
These are great kitchen hacks! I also don't like to clean and try to spend as less time as possible doing it. Even sometimes in the most busy days I call the kind women from Wimbledon Carpet Cleaners (www.wimbledoncarpetcleaners.org.uk)! The times that I clean the house, though, I try to do everything fast and effective and I love to use cleaning hacks that will make everything clean and sparkly with minimum effort! I love the tea bag tips! I didn't know that I can use the tea bags this way and I drink teas all the time so I can use the tea bags for the dishes with no problem! Lovely post! Thanks so much! :)
Deanna Segrave-Daly
Monday 31st of August 2015
Thanks for visiting and your comments :)