Almost everyone dislikes throwing items away needlessly. It always helps to find alternative ways of reusing various items rather than discarding them. For instance, leftover coffee is something often discarded, yet it can be reused creatively.
If you’re fond of discarding leftover coffee, probably due to lacking rich flavors or staleness, you should rethink your decision. There’re several creative ways of using leftover coffee. Reusing them will save you a lot of money. Here’s how you can reuse leftover coffee.
- Home Projects
You can use coffee in several home projects, for both interior and exterior applications including:
- Furniture varnish
If you have antique or older furniture items that look faded, or your wooden floor has developed scratches due to regular tear and wear, don’t get stressed with their condition. You can upgrade them by dabbing coffee on the faded or scratched surfaces until they get your desired finish. For instance, you can achieve lighter finishes by applying less coffee. Apply more coffee for darker finishes. You can reapply several coatings where necessary. By retouching them with coffee, they’ll look attractive like new.Plant care
Any botanist out there knows that some plant species require high soil acidity to thrive. The high acidity in coffee makes it a perfect material to give the plants the much-needed nutrients to grow healthy. In this case, pour some little coffee over the soil in a way that it surrounds the plants in question, just the way you do when watering the plants. However, avoid overdoing it. A little amount is sufficient.
- Cleaning grills and stoves
If you cook regularly, you’re likely to deal with the buildup of grease stains on the grill or stove grates. Coffee can save you from the stress of removing grease stains. The acidity in coffee eats away the grease to reveal a clean surface that looks like new. Actually, soaking detachable stove grates in coffee works best to remove stubborn grease stains.
- Art and craft
If you like art, there’re several ways you can use coffee to craft projects such as:
- Fabric dye
Any coffee lover who’s talented to make clothes can find it fun to make fabric dye with leftover coffee. To do this, stain the fabric with coffee to give it a unique antique effect.
- Staining wood
Coffee is a great product to stain wood for a richer and darker look. You should apply more coffee for a darker finish. If your coffee brewing method uses filters, wring out the used grounds and use the resultant coffee liquid as a wood stain. Reapply the stain until the wooden surface gets the kind of effect you want.
- iii. Antique paper
Just like how fabric gets stained by coffee, paper also gets an antique look when stained with liquid coffee. When creating items such as wedding cards with paper, staining the paper will give it an antique look.
- Cooking
Besides using coffee to make your favorite coffee beverage, you can also use it for cooking. In fact, coffee can be added to beer. Here’re some great recipes that include coffee as one of their main ingredients:
- Marinade
Coffee is a great marinade for various foods, especially beef. You can try to mix coffee with ginger, chili powder, and soy sauce to make a delicious marinade for tasty dishes.
- Coffee brownies
You can make coffee brownies by using coffee instead of milk. In this case, add about ¼ of coffee and some fine ground coffee when making a brownie mix. All other ingredients should be added normally.
- Oatmeal
If you’re not getting enough coffee during your daily morning routine, you can replace water or milk with oatmeal or combine them as per your preferences. Add some cinnamon for extra flavor.
- Personal Care
No one likes looking dull. You can actually look your best by adding coffee to your regular beauty regime. Coffee works as a great skin exfoliator. If you love facials and massages to keep your skin looking fresh and feeling smoother, try coffee in your skin exfoliation routine and save the money you’d use on expensive exfoliators. In this case, mix coffee with some olive oil. The mixture acts as a brand facial scrub, thanks to the abrasive nature of the micro-beans in coffee grounds.
