DIY Fruit and Vegetable Wash Helps Combat Pesticides
Welcome back for our weekly DIY series featuring various Do-It-Yourself health and wellness recipes or green DIY projects. This week, it’s all about fruits and vegetables and getting them clean affordably with an all natural DIY Fruit and Vegetable wash. We previously covered the top 10 dirtiest foods with pesticide residue and now it’s time to cope with those pesticides sometimes found in abundance on your favourite produce (hello, apples!). Over the next couple of weeks we’ll explore how vinegar can help with your green cleaning while simultaneously saving you a lot of money on cleaning products that are often laced with toxic chemicals and not environmentally friendly.
Photo credit: iStockphoto.com
Vinegar is a harmless, all-natural cleaning product with no toxic chemicals. Plus it’s incredibly cheap to buy and you can buy in bulk and pay even less. This recipe for DIY Fruit and Veggie wash is courtesy of Planet Green:
What you need:
1 spray bottle
1 tbsp. lemon juice (use fresh lemon juice if possible)
2 tbsp. baking soda
3/4 cup white vinegar
1 cup of filtered water
Directions:
1. Mix all ingredients well in a sprayer bottle.
2. Shake before use.
3. Spray produce (except mushrooms, because they absorb and retain water) and let sit for 5-10 minutes.
4. Rinse well.
Preparation time:
This is the best part; the prep time is under 5 minutes.
So with a few simple steps, you have your own natural DIY Fruit and Vegetable wash that practically costs pennies because vinegar and water are the majority of the ingredients. Green cleaning couldn’t be any easier or more inexpensive. Why pay for a store-bought fruit and veggie wash when you can make one at home in minutes for a fraction of the cost?
November 30, 2011
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I love this!!! however, would like to know how to keep the mixture from “erupting” when mixing. I have made two batches and lost half or more w/ each batch bc of bubbling over. Any suggestions? Thanks
Thanks for reading. This recipe came courtesy of TLC’s Planet Green and it’s the combination of the baking soda and vinegar creating the bubbling effect. Perhaps you can try reducing the baking soda. Let us know if that works for you and thanks again for stopping by.
How long does this keep for? Can I keep it until its gone, or should I mix a new batch every so often?
Hi Stefanie,
Thanks for stopping by and for commenting. Any leftover solution would have to be refrigerated until used again because of the fresh lemon juice. I usually use up so much of the mixture that there isn’t enough to save.
I hope this helps – thanks again for reading.
Angela