For about two years, Sundays have been my meal prep day with my roommate. We’ve experimented with all sorts of meals for our work lunches, and most times than not, they’ve been successful. Of course we have some busy weekends where we have to rework our prepping schedule, but at the end of the day, we’ve learned more so that we feel lost during the week when we don’t have our lunch set for ourselves.
With that said, we spend a good chunk of time in the kitchen. With all this climate change talk happening, it dawned on me how much we waste on a daily basis. I’ve been taking baby steps here and there to incorporate reusable items in our home as best as I could. Of course, living with roommates, you can’t just tell them what to do. I give them the option to try out the reusable items I’m bringing into our home.
I’ve learned a lot. What works and what doesn’t, and I wanted to share my list of reusable kitchen items that I’ve tried and/or have been wanting to try!
Reducing the amount of plastic bag usage is pretty easy. Probably the easiest thing to replace on this list. They sell reusable bags almost everywhere you go. Grocery stores, malls, Ikea, everywhere. Bringing them to the grocery store is the part where sometimes it’s hard to remember, but once you get use to bringing reusable bags while shopping, it’s hard to go back to feeling comfortable buying items and carrying them in plastic bags.
If you wanted to check out other options, check these out:
✿ Baggu
✿ Putón Verbenero
✿ Olula
Produce bags are one of the last things I thought of when I was trying to replace plastic. The more produce I bought, the more bags I wasted, and it’s just as bad as plastic bags because produce bags really have a one time use. Mesh bags – such an easy fix!
Check these options out:
✿ Purifyou
✿ Ecobags
✿ Ikea
Plastic bottles for me are an easy thing to let go of. There are some occasions once every year where I’m at an event where water bottles aren’t allowed and I have no choice but to buy a water bottle to keep myself hydrated. But other than that, I refill my water bottle at airports, take my water bottle to work, and basically bring it everywhere I go. I’m also a heavy advocate for glass water bottles. Let me tell you, there’s no better taste than water coming out of a glass bottle or cup. You can taste the plastic and metal in reusable plastic water bottles and stainless steel ones. If I can preach about anything, it would be glass water bottles. Literally tastes like -nothing-.
Here are some options worth checking out:
✿ Contigo
✿ Soma
✿ Thrive Market
Paper towels are way too overused and wasted. I get irritated watching some people pull paper towels off the roll, but like over pull to the point where a good chunk of the roll is gone for the tiniest spill or mess. Disinfectant wipes are great, but they’re also just as wasteful. We’ve basically stopped buying paper towels in my house, especially after buying reusable dish cloths. You can use them to clean any surface. Use them with an all purpose cleaner to clean up and they’re better than paper towels. To clean them, you can really rinse them out, put them in the dishwasher, or washing machine and you can reuse them for a while. Eventually they do need to be replaced, but imagine how much money and paper you save by using one dish cloth every 3-4 months!
These are some brands worth trying:
✿ Three Blue Birds
✿ World’s Best Swedish Dishcloths
✿ Total Home Microfiber Cloths
Along with paper towels, paper napkins are equally just as overused and wasted, and really not needed. It’s truly an adjustment period to get used to it, but cloth napkins are just as good, absorbent, and comfortable. Honestly, I’ve been using cloth napkins for about two months and I’m still getting used to the feeling of cloth and not paper when I’m wiping my face and/or hands. But I’m determined to make it work.
Try these cloth napkins out:
✿ Moo Cow Momma
✿ Remiusables
✿ Baby Bird Craft
Something that I never thought so much about were sponges. Really, you reuse sponges for a bit anyway before disposing of them, but it’s still the disposing part that creates waste. Not as much as the other items on this list, but you can still decrease the wastage by checking out these sponges that you can reuse and wash constantly – as much as you wish.
Check out these sponges:
✿ Marley’s Monsters
✿ Rowen Stillwater
✿ Whale And Me
I’m sure you’ve seen videos and images of turtles with straws stuck in their nasal cavities. It’s an unsettling feeling seeing animals so heavily effected by our waste. This is an easy one to avoid.
They make so many reusable straw options, why not try them out? It’s easy, I promise!
✿ Penguin Straws
✿ Silicone Bebe Co
✿ Lovely Global
Plastic wrap is so unnecessary, but I can see why it would be hard for people to give up the convenience of plastic wrap. It’s cool to see people using beeswax as a coating for reusable wraps, and they seem super effective.
They’re easy to maintain. Try it out!
✿ Ecohabit
✿ Wild Clementine Co
✿ Goose And Bee
Another item that involves unnecessary wastage are one-time use storage bags, and/or ziplock bags. They make so many reusable bags that you can use to store snacks, sandwiches, candy, etc. They come in different sizes, and they’re easy to clean.
Drop those storage bags and try these out:
✿ Nordic By Nature
✿ Tiblue
✿ The Traveling Bee Shop
I hope this was inspiring and I hope y’all make some positive changes. Take baby steps and see how any of these options work out for you!
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