Recipe 86 of 100 · The Country Cleans Mix Book
How to Get Rid of Trash Can Smell for Good
Kitchen and Outdoor Bins
That sour smell that stays after the bag is gone? Scrub the can with 1 gallon hot water, 2 cups white vinegar and 1/4 cup dish soap, rim underside included, let it stand 30 minutes, then dry it upside down in the sun. Sprinkle 1/2 cup baking soda and 2 tablespoons borax in the bottom before each bag. Never bleach a trash can, it can make toxic gas.
What it fixesThe sour rotten smell in kitchen bins and outdoor garbage cans that survives taking the bag out.
You need
- 1 gallon hot water (3.8 L)
- 2 cups white vinegar (475 ml)
- 1/4 cup dish soap
- 1/2 cup baking soda, kept dry
- 2 tablespoons borax, from the laundry aisle
- Stiff long handled brush
- Garden hose or a shower
Mix it
- Combine the hot water, vinegar and dish soap in a bucket. This is the wash.
- In a separate cup, stir the dry baking soda and borax together. This is the dry treatment that goes in at the end. Do not add it to the wash.
Use it
- Empty the can completely and take it outside or into a shower stall.
- Pour in about a quart of the wash, then scrub every inch including the lid, the rim, the underside of the rim and the handle. The rim underside is where most of the smell actually lives.
- Fill the can with the rest of the wash and let it stand for 30 minutes so the solution sits against the bottom seams.
- Dump it, rinse, and set the can upside down in direct sun until it is bone dry inside. Sun does more sanitizing than any spray you can buy.
- Sprinkle the baking soda and borax mix across the dry bottom of the can before the next bag goes in, and repeat that every time you change the bag.
Dale's noteThe smell is bacteria feeding on liquid that leaked through pinholes in the bag. Two sheets of newspaper or a scoop of the dry mix in the bottom absorbs the leak before it can ferment, and it costs nothing.
Don'tDo not leave the dry borax mix in a bin a dog can nose open or a toddler can reach into, since borax is harmful swallowed. Never pour bleach into a trash can to kill the smell. Bins routinely hold ammonia from diapers, pet waste and old cleaner bottles, and bleach hitting any of it in an enclosed plastic can produces toxic gas right in your face.
This is 1 of 100 mixes in the Mix Book
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