Use Coffee Grounds For A Better Smelling Fridge
Regardless of how often you clear or clean your refrigerator, it can be a hub for unpleasant smells. Whether it's pungent fish and cheeses or a big dinner just happened to take over the shelves and leave behind its scent, keeping your fridge fresh can be an uphill battle. Many people keep baking soda in theirs to help absorb and draw in strong odors, but there's a great alternative that also allows you to reuse a common item you probably interact with every day — coffee grounds. Instead of throwing out your grounds after use, put them in the fridge to combat accumulated smells, since they neutralize them in an eco-friendly way!
You might have seen jars of coffee beans in stores like Ulta throughout the perfume section, but this trick isn't just for the big box companies. The best part of this hack is it allows you to allocate waste within the kitchen to serve a secondary purpose, creating less guilt around the amount of coffee you dump each day.
Dried coffee grounds for a DIY deodorizer
Coffee might be the lifeblood many people swear by to get through their mornings (and even afternoons), but it also contains a beneficial ingredient known to neutralize odors. Nitrogen is a key component in coffee, or more specifically the caffeine in the grounds, and it helps give carbon a boost which dispels strong smells. In fact, according to Science Daily, a study to mitigate sewer stenches in New York used coffee grounds to quell the intense fumes, with nitrogen acting as a supercharger for the carbon which was present. The two worked together to negate the sulfur smell produced by the sewers, and if the grounds can help on a scale that big, they can certainly help diminish food smells on your fridge's shelves.
The easiest way to incorporate this hack into your routine and ensure it works to the maximum benefit is to spread your leftover coffee grounds across a clean baking sheet. This will give them the chance to dry out, which in turn makes them more proficient at absorbing smells. After you're sure they have released all the moisture they were holding, throw the dried grounds into a cup, bowl, or jar and leave it open so the grounds can do their thing.
More on leftover coffee grounds
If you're worried about a mess, you can also place a cover over the top with some holes punctured into it. This will still allow the coffee grounds to absorb scents but the risk of a spill is less likely. In order to maintain a fresh appliance at all times, you should swap the grounds out every few weeks, or at least once a month. If you make coffee every day, or even if you drink it occasionally, you can save the grounds until they are needed for a fresh batch in the back of your refrigerator.
This household pantry item isn't just useful for keeping your fridge from getting smelly — you can also use it as a body scrub by combining coffee grounds with melted coconut oil. You can also keep them near your sink to help scrub extra dirty plates or other dishes (as long as they don't have a porous surface). They can even be used to create clever home decor like candles, which will help neutralize other odors around your dwelling as they melt.