Your Fridge Will Smell So Much Better With This Surprising Coffee Hack

It's not hard to forget to clean the refrigerator. Thankfully, our nose will remind us. Maybe you went on vacation and forgot about that takeout container, or maybe a child in the house let their science project go on a little too long — life happens. The fridge is there to preserve food, but it's not immune to bacteria. One of the best defenses for keeping it fresh and clean is already in your kitchen.

Coffee grounds are a natural deodorizer that can zap the funk from your fridge. Vegetables, meat, and eggs can have a terrible rotting smell because their decomposition process releases sulfur. Coffee, and especially espresso, has a high concentration of caffeine: a chemical compound containing carbon and nitrogen. Nitrogen helps carbon to adsorb sulfur, almost as if grabbing foul odors right out of the air. So next time you make a cup of coffee, just scoop the grounds into a coffee filter or bowl and place them in the fridge overnight.

It's a bad idea to use coffee grounds for a second cup, but that doesn't mean you can't reuse them elsewhere. Coffee grounds can restore minor scratches on dark wood kitchen cabinets and tables when mixed with a bit of water. They can freshen up a gunky garbage disposal and unstick food from the sink with their abrasive texture, which is why you should use coffee grounds to scrub the dirtiest of pans, grills, and stovetops.

Coffee isn't only good for the hardware — it can actually help deodorize your hands. That's a pretty big deal when working with all sorts of pungent foods. It's a great ingredient for homemade soaps, and rubbing coffee grounds between your hands can get rid of stubborn garlic and onion odors (not to mention exfoliate your skin). The scent of a brewing pot will attract you and your guests while repelling certain insects from sneaking into your cooking zone. Just make sure to save those grounds to freshen up your fridge!