Top Uses For Used Coffee Grounds
Making a pot of coffee is part of the daily morning routine for millions of people. Whether you use a French press, a pour-over system, or a classic coffee brewer, the result is the same — delicious hot coffee. But along with the tasty pot of coffee you are also left with a small pile of coffee grounds each morning. After throwing these natural grounds out day after day, you might be left wondering if there are other ways to use your used coffee grounds.
Coffee grounds are high in nitrogen, which makes them excellent fertilizers, and they are also great deodorizers. Grounds are even great for growing your own mushrooms. They are also effective at repelling insects including ants and beetles and even removing fleas from your pets. You can use coffee grounds to make your own scented candles, an exfoliating bathing scrub, or even use them in your hair to remove residue and stimulate hair growth.
If you are someone who hates throwing things in the trash, especially natural ingredients, then you probably want to find ways to use your fresh coffee grounds. Luckily, coffee grounds are loaded with nutrients, smells, and textures that are useful in many situations. Continue reading to discover the top 10 ways that you can use your coffee grounds in and around your home.
10 Ways To Use Coffee Grounds Instead Of Throwing Them Out
1. Use Them For Fertilizer In Your Garden
People brew coffee for its taste and its caffeine. But believe it or not, there are tons of nutrients in coffee grounds that your plants need — and you are unknowingly throwing them away. Coffee grounds are very high in nitrogen, which is an essential nutrient for plant growth. They also have high levels of other key plant nutrients including phosphorus, iron, calcium, and magnesium.
You can sprinkle your coffee grounds into flowerpots in your home from time to time to give them a nutrient boost. Consider adding a cup of them each time you pot new plants. Most importantly, add all remaining coffee grounds to your compost pile. This is a fantastic way to further boost the nutrients in your compost pile.
2. Make A Body Scrub
If you are an avid DIY enthusiast and passionate about health and beauty, look no further than this usage for coffee grounds. Coffee grounds make for a fantastic ingredient in a body scrub.
Coffee grounds are great at exfoliating the skin and removing dead skin cells. You can mix a combination of three parts coffee grounds with one part coconut oil and one part brown sugar to make a great natural body scrub. Coffee grounds are also linked to helping reduce the appearance of cellulite. This is an added bonus. Plus, the smell of coffee in the shower is bound to help wake you up in the morning.
3. Grow Your Own Mushrooms
These days, people are doing a lot more from scratch, and this even means they are growing their own mushrooms. It seems mushroom-growing kits are more readily available now than ever before .
Coffee grounds are great to help grow mushrooms. They are high in nitrogen, and they are sanitized since they are boiled to make coffee. You can use them in a combination of mushroom spores and sawdust to create a DIY mushroom-making kit.
4. They Help Clean Dirty Pots And Pans
Do you have dirty pots and pans soaking in the sink from the night before? If so, don’t you dare throw out those coffee grounds. Coffee grounds have acid and grit that can help give your sponge or cleaning rag that extra “something” it needs to get the food residue off pots and pans.
Best of all, coffee grounds are likely to be readily available in the morning, when your pots and pans are ready to be deep cleaned after a night of soaking.
5. Use Them In Hair To Stimulate Growth And Remove Residue
Coffee grounds are also great at removing residue from your hair. If you use a strong hair product like a wax, pomade, or even hair spray, then you might find it can stay in your hair for days. This is true even after washing it with shampoo.
Using a handful of coffee grounds and massaging them into your hair will help the residue stick to the coffee grounds and get off your hair. There have also been some studies suggesting that the caffeine in coffee grounds might actually help stimulate your scalp and promote hair growth.
6. Make Your Own Scented Candles
If you are a fan of coffee and scented candles, then this is the project for you. As you may have noticed, coffee grounds still have a fantastic coffee aroma even after they have steeped in water. You can use this smell by trapping it inside a candle.
There are several candle recipes that use coffee grounds to make coffee-scented candles. Using grounds is a great way to get the fragrance, as you are able to see the tiny pieces of coffee beans in the candle itself.
7. Repair Scuffed And Scratched Wood
The dark mocha color of coffee looks strikingly like many dark wood stains. It is likely no surprise then, that coffee grounds are often used to remove the appearance of scuff and scratch marks on wood.
Simply place some coffee grounds in a small cup and add a bit of water. Then dip a Q-tip in the water and apply it to the scratched or scuffed area. Let the liquid sit for about 10 minutes and then use a microfiber cloth to buff the area, and you should notice a great improvement.
8. Coffee Grounds Melt Ice
Salt is not the only household item that can melt ice. Again, it is the nitrogen in the grounds that make it possible for it to melt ice. Coffee grounds help lower the freezing point, which helps ice to melt.
While you probably don’t want to throw coffee grounds all over your driveway, there are all sorts of occasions where this may come in handy, so it is great to keep in mind.
9. Get Rid Of Bad Refrigerator Or Freezer Smells
Coffee grounds are also a great deodorizer. The best way to use coffee grounds is in a funky-smelling fridge or down a questionable-smelling garbage disposal.
Put some dried coffee grounds in an open container in your fridge or freezer and let it works its magic. It works similarly to baking soda, in that it pulls away smells rather than masking them. This helps keep your fridge smelling fresh.
10. Insect Repellent
Lastly, coffee grounds are also an effective insect repellent. You can add them around plants or areas in the home where you have have noticed an influx of bugs like ants or beetles.
Many bugs are repelled by some of the acids and smells that exist in coffee grounds. This makes them a great natural bug repellent. In fact, for those looking for natural flea remedies for their pets, consider coffee grounds.
After shampooing your animal, use some coffee grounds and massage them into the skin of the animal. This might not be as effective as chemical treatments, but fleas are known to dislike coffee grounds.
Wrapping Up Uses For Coffee Grounds
The next time you brew yourself some coffee, you should pause before tossing the grounds in the garbage. There are all sorts of uses for your coffee grounds. You can make your own body scrub or candles. Coffee grounds make fantastic plant food, and can be used in your hair, or put in the fridge to remove bad smells. They can even repair wood and repel bugs, so consider repurposing your coffee grounds as often as possible.
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Tom Gaffey is an expert writer who currently resides in Washington D.C. Tom has a passion for real estate and home improvement writing, as well as travel and lifestyle writing. He lived the last twelve years in Hawaii where he worked closely with luxury resorts and event planners, mastering his knowledge of aesthetics and luxury products. This is where he found his passion for home improvement and a keen interest in DIY projects. Currently, Tom resides in Washington D.C, and also working on his debut fiction novel.
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