Gardener's 'lazy' hack to cleaning dishes with unusual vegetable scrap

A gardening fan has shared her 'lazy' trick to using a vegetable scrap as a cleaning tool to have your pots and pans sparkling.

Cleaning around the house has never been easier with many DIY solutions that use the likes of white vinegar, baking soda and more. But, what if you could grow your own cleaning materials?

Rhubarb is a solid vegetable that can be used in a variety of different dishes including pies, desserts and even as a flavouring in gin. However, the vegetable can be grown in your own backyard and its leaves are a perfect item to use for cleaning your dishes.

One gardening enthusiast shared her rhubarb tricks on her TikTok, where she is known as @thecottagepeach, in a video that has garnered an impressive 478,500 views on her page.

The green-thumbed individual captioned the video: "Growing your own rhubarb is easy - edible perennials make the best lazy gardening hack. But what to do with all the leaves? Here's some ideas."

The woman started the video by warning gardeners of the dangers of rhubarb leaves. She said: "It's not everyday you grow something poisonous in your garden with the intention of eating it. You can't eat rhubarb leaves because they're high in oxalic acid but they're still useful and if you're harvesting stalks for dessert, you may want to try these tricks to use up your leaves."

She continued: "You can use them to shine pots and pans and also create a pest repellent to spray on your non-edible plants. Use them as slug traps or even make them into a natural dye."

The expert concluded: "Most importantly, oxalic acid is not absorbed by plant roots and breaks down fast so you won't create poisonous compost if you decide to just chuck them straight in the bin - leaving you free to focus on turning those ruby red stems into a tart."

Viewers headed to the comments section to share their thoughts on these tips as one person asked: "How do you use them as slug traps? Just by planting lots of rhubarb or making a rhubarb leaf tea that you spray on problem areas?"

The woman replied: "You can just place a leaf on the ground. They will gather under it and then you can dispose of the leaf and slugs at the same time."

Another asked: "What colour dye do they make?"

The woman replied: "It depends on the temperature and mordant but can range from yellow to brown or pink."

Others shared their expertise as one noted: "It can also be used in beekeeping if you make it in to a powder!"

A second added: "Use the leave as forms to make concrete decorative bowels - paint them to look live real leaves."

And a third said: "Oxalic acid.. in woodworking we use that to bleach wood and remove stains! Crazy."

Would you use any of these rhubarb hacks in your garden or kitchen? Let us know in the comments below.

Don't miss the latest news from around Scotland and beyond - Sign up to our newsletter here.