Everyday ingredients can do double duty in cleaning your home. By utilizing foods found in the pantry, you not only help out the environment, but also your health and your wallet.

Some of our favourite foods are perfect as natural cleansing products – and can double for dinner, too.

Club Soda

To clean: This fizzy drink is effective in removing stains. Like a bubbling detergent, the same effect in club soda lifts stains from mugs, clothing, and silver.

To drink: Mix it with a dash of pure fruit juice, or a twist of lime. Cooling and carbonated, without the calories of pop or juice.

Baking Soda

To clean: Place an open box in the fridge to absorb odors, and use to clean on counter and stove tops, and in the fridge.

To eat: Use it in baked goods to help dough rise in your favourite muffins, cakes, and cupcakes.

Cream of Tartar

To clean: Combine with vinegar for cleaning encrusted posts, pans, and stove tops.

To eat: Stabilize egg whites in meringues to increase their heat tolerance and volume. It’s also often used in candy making.

Corn Starch

To clean: Have a nasty stain? Cover it with cornstarch. Let sit for about 30 minutes, then vacuum.

To eat: Use as a thickener in cooking, or to lighten up your favourite baked goods, such as in shortbread cookies.

Lemon Juice

To clean: Use for dissolving soap scum and hard water deposits, to clean and shine brass and copper and as a natural bleach. You can also cut a lemon in half, sprinkle baking soda and use it as a scrub for dishes. Polish your furniture with a mixture of 1 cup olive oil with 1/2 cup lemon juice, or clean silver with a paste of lemon juice and baking

soda.

To eat: Enjoy instead of vinegar on your favourite salads, and add a twist of citrus to your favourite marinades, especially seafood. Have a little more time? Nothing beats a lemon buttermilk cake.

Salt

To clean: Salt can combat deep stains, such as wine and blood. For wine stains, cover with salt, then rinse with cold water; for blood, soak in cold salt water, then wash in

warm soapy water, followed by boiling it after the wash. Left a ring on your favourite

table from a wet glass? Rub together a thin paste of vegetable oil and salt on your fingers, let it stand for a couple hours, then wipe clean.

To eat: Add flavour to everything, including sweet treats – salt enhances the natural and

added flavours of your ingredients.

White Vinegar

To clean: The queen of cleaning, white vinegar is the ultimate in all purpose products. It’s cheap, safe to use on most surfaces, and effective. Mix equal parts vinegar to water in a spray bottle and you’re set. (Check out the wealth of info at vinegartips.com)

To eat: Tons of uses, from dressings to activating baking soda, a great tip is for when poaching eggs: add a little white vinegar to the water, and the whites stay better formed.

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