The French press coffee maker is a favorite among coffee lovers. The ground coffee steeps with water for a few minutes before it’s pressed against a strainer to produce strong coffee. Once this process is complete, you have coffee grounds in your french press. How do you dispose of the used grounds properly after using a French press to avoid damage in your kitchen?
There are several ways you can drain the coffee grounds from your French press, whether you toss them in the trash or turn them into compost to go in the soil for plants. Many options are vital to become familiar with, and we can help you.
In this post, I’ll explore how to dispose of coffee grounds from your French press and more. Let’s get started!
How Do You Dispose of Coffee Grounds?
So, how can you get rid of coffee grounds? Two main ways will help you rinse your French press clear of the fine coffee grounds. It’s vital to know about these so you don’t clog your pipes or stink up a space with the scent that comes with even a tiny amount of coffee grounds. These techniques are the most effective for French press coffee maker disposal.
The two best ways to throw away coffee grounds include:
- Throwing them away
- Turning them into compost
These are the most effective methods to dispose of the coffee grounds inside a French press.
Next, we’ll go over each of these techniques so you can get a better idea of how to clean out your French press. Once you’ve done this task, you can fill it up again for the next delicious coffee brewing session.
Throw Them Away
The first choice is to throw away coffee grounds in your trash can. After this, ensure you give your French press a good rinse in the sink to catch any extras left in the system. Make sure your extra coffee gets wrapped up tight when it goes in the garbage to keep the smell in one place.
When you throw your grounds in the garbage, ensure that you:
- Keep everything folded up in paper to avoid spillage
- Collect all leftover grounds from the press
- Rinse the press clean after, ensuring you pat it dry
Once you’ve completed these, your grounds will be out of the way and ready for the same thing all over again.
Throwing your grounds away is the most common solution, but there’s another path you can take if you would prefer to make the most out of your excess. We’ll talk about composting next, so proactive coffee makers can grow something new with the small sieve of coffee grounds that come from a coffee filter.
Compost Them
Another thing you can do with the coffee grounds is compost them after brewing. This technique has been around for quite some time. Rather than pouring them into the trash can, you can put them into a container to collect valuable nutrients for the growth of plants in the future. Coffee grounds from French presses can be beneficial for any garden system.
To compost them, you will need to do the following:
- Work the coffee grounds into a compost pile
- Allowing everything to sit for as long as necessary
- Making use of the fertilizer that results in your growth
These steps will allow you to create a compost pile out of wet coffee grounds. You can even compost used coffee filters in your compost bin.
Composting is a choice that can benefit any plants you’re growing, whether that might be a tomato plant or a field of grass. We’ll dive into what you can do with the result of your composting efforts a little later in this piece. This effort can have an impact on the earth and allows you to improve your compost bin at the same time.
Is It Okay to Throw Coffee Grounds Down the Sink?
Let’s face it – most of us toss our coffee grounds down the sink when we need to get rid of them fast. While that might feel like an ideal location for used coffee grounds to go, it’s not. You should avoid letting used coffee grounds make contact with your garbage disposal at all costs. There are lots of disadvantages to putting them in a sink drain, including a clogged drain and ruined garbage disposal at the least.
If you want to pour coffee grounds into your kitchen sink, ensure that you add protective items to your drain, like a fine mesh sink strainer. A mesh strainer will keep the waste from clogging up your pipes and damaging your garbage disposal. You can dump the excess down the sink, then dump the leftover grounds into the trash can with the help of the mesh strainer.
You shouldn’t put coffee grounds down your toilet or shower drain, either. In a septic system, coffee grounds have no way of breaking down in a septic tank. You could damage your septic tank or impact a city sewer. Take care to dispose of your grounds to avoid trouble later down the line. A damaged system isn’t worth any amount of saved time.
What Can I Do with Leftover French Press Grounds?
So, what can you do with leftover French press grounds? There are a few techniques you can use to make the most out of the used grounds. Before you put them in the trash or put them in compost, consider all your options to make the most out of all the grounds. With a little effort, this excess can go much farther than the trash can.
There are four excellent things you can do with leftover French press grounds, which include:
- Turning them into fertilizer
- Making a skin scrub
- Creating a dye for clothes or paper
- Scrubbing difficult dishes
These are some ideal things you can do with these grounds.
We’ll talk more about these ideas in-depth so you can have a better understanding of how used coffee grounds play into each. The more you know about what you can do with the leftover French press coffee grounds, the better equipped you will be to make the most of the garbage you’re left with after making a delicious cup of coffee.
Turn them Into Fertilizer
One of the most common alternatives to tossing used coffee grounds is fertilizer. You can put your old grounds in a compost pile and utilize them to help create new life, rather than wasting them by chucking your used grounds and coffee beans into the trashcan. Fertilizer can help a garden thrive, or make for a good fertilizer in a lawn. The remaining grounds can be turned into something useful.
We talked above about how you can use coffee grounds in a compost pile. Once this has been sitting for long enough, you can take some of the compost and spread it around the plants that need a little help growing. Make sure you pack it close to give them the best nutrients so they can thrive.
Fertilizer is excellent for any plant. Coffee grounds can keep bugs away and give your plants the chance to grow, rather than get eaten before they have a chance to blossom. Take advantage of this unique benefit that comes with coffee grounds from a French press!
Make a Skin Scrub
If you wanted, you could make a skin scrub out of a few of the spent grounds. The rough texture of the grounds makes for a satisfying exfoliation, even on the toughest skin. All you need is a little bit of spent coffee a few other ingredients, and you can make a solid skin product that can last a long time. If you love taking care of your skin, the wet coffee ground can be a great help in your life.
To make a skin scrub that will be good for your skin, you should:
- Mix half a cup of coffee with the same amount of brown sugar
- Add the same amount of coconut oil
- Combine a scent, such as vanilla or mint
Once you mix everything, you’ll have a skin scrub. You can put it into a container for future use. Refrigerate it if you want the scrub to last a long time.
To use the skin scrub, all you need to do is rub it on your skin. Then, rinse it off down the drain of your sink and put lotion on afterward. A coffee ground skin scrub is incredible for your skin, and it is a minimal amount of coffee ground so you can wash it away in a shower or bathroom sink.
Create a Dye
If you love the brown color that comes with coffee, you can use the waste to create a dye before you dump the grinds. Before they end up in the trash, you can use a little water to make a wash that can dye anything from t-shirts to pieces of paper. Before you get rid of the remaining grounds, consider this option. You can do a lot with the dye that comes from coffee grounds.
To dye clothes with a coffee ground dye, you will need to do the following:
- Soak coffee grounds in a container with hot water
- Take out the coffee grounds with a strainer
- Soak the clothes
- Allow them to soak for at least an hour
- Rinse off the clothes, using a paper towel to pick up spills
After these steps, you should have a beautiful dyed piece.
Coffee creates a unique color that is unique to the beverage. It makes for an amazing dye if you have clothes that need something a little extra added to them.
Scrub Difficult Dishes
Finally, you can utilize the leftovers of great coffee to scrub difficult stains that sit on dishes. This use can come in handy if you hand wash your dishes, rather than putting them in a dishwasher. From suctioned food to leftover oils, coffee grounds that you grind coarsely allow you to wash dishes with more detail. Pause before you dump grinds if you have irritatingly stained dishes.
To scrub dishes with coffee grounds, take a couple of teaspoons of the used product and put them on a wet dishrag. Then, you can utilize the cloth to deal with pesky additions to a dirty dish. Coffee grounds are very effective at cleaning, which many are not familiar with. Why not try it out?
Why is French Press Coffee Bad For You?
If you care about your health, you may have heard that French press coffee is known to be bad for your health. Is there any truth to that? It might seem ridiculous that this form of coffee is bad for you, whereas regular coffee is not as bad for you. There’s one difference between these two – the coffee filter.
French press coffee is not as filtered as traditional ground coffee brewed in a pot. Because of this, it can slightly raise your cholesterol if you drink more than nine cups a day. Chemical compounds known as diterpenes can harm your system with unfiltered coffee.
The simple solution is to limit your intake of French press coffee a day. When you fill a pot, ensure you use a paper filter or strainer as much as possible. Keep unfiltered coffee to one or two cups a day for the best results in your health.
Final Thoughts on Disposing Used Coffee Grounds
When you make coffee with a French press, you’ll get coffee ground as a form of spent coffee after the cup is made. Many may not think that the disposal process of this product is critical, but what you do with the fine powder is vital.
You can’t throw coffee grounds in the kitchen sink, but you can turn them into a compost bin for a garden. You can dispose of the waste in the garbage to keep your pipes clear or turn the leftovers into a scrub for your face. There’s so much you can do with coffee grounds from a French press! We hope this information helps you out the next time you utilize a French press.
