Reducing disposables: The Kitchen
I'll be creating a little series on reducing plastic & disposables, each with a focus on different household rooms. you can honestly get away with diy, or just buying regular items instead of expensive eco-friendly products. The benefit of using cloth is that you can wash & reuse them over and over again. I'll provide some tutorials but there plenty of other tutorials online on YouTube, or blogs. same with products, i'm not going to go heavily into recommendations either.
Paper-towels, and Napkins:
- cut up old t-shirts, clothes, sheets, etc to make different sized rags to replace paper towels / napkins
- use old towels or wash clothes as paper towels
- you can sew or buy cloth napkins like the fancy restaurants use
Ziplock / plastic zipper bags:
- sew a reusable snack/sandwich bags using fabric, zipper/velcro, & a waterproof material like pul (many tutorials on youtube)
- zipper pencil cases
- mesh zipper/drawstring bags for produce ( mesh laundry bags are usually sold at dollartree)
- re-purpose old jars or other plastic food containers
Plastic wrap & Aluminum foil:
- silicone food bowl covers
- fabric food bowl covers (you can buy these online practically everywhere)
- bee-wax wraps (its cheaper to diy it)
Water bottles:
- water filters that go attach to the sink, or work as a pitcher.
- water dispenser device
- fill gallon, 3 gallon, or 5 gallon jugs at water filling stations like twice the ice, primo, or watermill (usually in grocery stores)
Cleaners:
- get a plastic or glass spray bottle to refill with cleaner concentrate tablets
- example concentrate brands: blueland, zep pro-tabs, simply earth cleaning tabs, onetab usa, affresh
- use powdered dish washer detergent over pods (pods are typically use pva which is a liquid plastic)
- use bar dish soaps instead of liquid ones
- use powdered cleaners instead that have to be mixed with water to work (ex: ajax, bar keepers friend, comet)