Discarding used oil/fat

[htc]

How do you all discard drippings or used grease from cooking? I've always wondered what the "proper" way of disposing of it. (aka earth friendly w/o being too much of a pain in the butt.) Just toss it into the garbage?

In the past I have put it into an empty tin can and froze it and then tossed the frozen oil. What have you done? Any suggestions?

 

[kitchenelf]

I usually just wait until it's cool then toss in garbage. If I have a tin can around Iwill toss hot oil into that if I need to.

 

[Michael in FtW]

I keep a coffee can around and pour my grease that I want to discard into it (anything but bacon or pork sausage drippings!). When it's full I toss it in the garbage. I live in an apartment so I have a dumpster and don't have to worry about a greasy garbage can ... if you have a house you might try putting your "grease can" in the freezer and then tossing it into the garbage in the morning when you put the garbage our for pickup.

The worms in the soil at the landfill eat it.

 

[lyndalou]

I never thought of freezing the oil. Good idea. The stuff doesn't solidify in the refrigerator, I know. Bacon grease does, but I usually keep that. I put chicken skin ,etc. in the freezer and get rid of it on "garbage day".

Michael how do you know that the worms in the landfill eat it? Just curious.

 

[htc]

I'm hoping just tossing it in the garbage isn't too bad for the environment, not that I would have an alternative. :?

Guess it'll be to the freezer in a can and then to the dumpster then.

 

[Alix]

htc, it is biodegradable so I think the environment will be OK. Also...hope this doesn't gross you out, if you leave the can open often the scavenger birds and bugs etc will eat the fat. Many birds need fat, especially in the winter, so you are doing a service to the birdies.

 

[htc]

Thanks Alix, now I don't feel so guilty.

 

[GB]

I have a can I keep in the freezer just for this. When it is full then I put it out on trash day.

 

[AllenOK]

I'm like everybody else. I keep a tin can in the frige and pour extra grease into that.

When I get rid of the oil from my deep-fryer, I pour the oil back into the bottle I bought it in, then dump that into the trash.

If you have A LOT of used oil, like several gallons, check if any of your local restaurants will let you dump it into their grease bin. All that excess oil gets recycled into other things.

 

[Michael in FtW]

Michael how do you know that the worms in the landfill eat it? Just curious.

Because my grandpa said so.

Actually, when I was a child I asked Grandpa why he always poured leftover grease in the same area in the back yard ... he said it was to feed the worms. He might have been crazy, but that is where we dug for worms to go fishing ... and we always had more worms than we could use.

 

[lyndalou]

Thank you,Michael

 

[norgeskog]

In the past I have put it into an empty tin can and froze it and then tossed the frozen oil. What have you done? Any suggestions?

htc, I am trying to understand this, why freeze? When you put it in the garbage/trash it will just thaw and be fluid again. Where I live we recycle everything (I hear Oregon leads the nation for recycling) so I do not have cans to use, but when unwanted oils/grease cools I just pour into the trash and it is absorbed by whatever trash is in there. As I do not deep fry foods and use very little oil when I saute, I do not have much oils to discard.

 

[htc]

Hi Norg, I'm in Oregon as well and know what you mean about the recycling. I recyle everything as well, but on the rare occassion I have used oil, I try to find something to put it in.

Call me crazy, but the idea of putting it straight into my trash doesn't always sit well with me. I know it melts once in the landfill, but still...for several reasons: I'm afraid somehow there will be a hole in my garbage bag (big clean up mess I wouldn't look foward to) and it'll leak. Also the smell of old grease stays in my little apartment for a long time, so I try to get rid of it as soon as I can. And it just somehow seems "cleaner" to me, though it probably isn't.

I know it makes no sense...even as I type this I see the holes in my logic, but still can't help it.

p.s. to add to this kind of absurdity, sometimes I don't use my garbage disposal and go out of my way to take stuff out of it so I don't "over use" it. Makes no sense, but it's another one of my quirks.

 

[mudbug]

The container is important, norge. Otherwise you are attracting all sorts of critters besides worms to crawl into the garbage can to get at that lovely grease. Frozen "canned" fat is not likely to thaw completely before the garbage truck gets there.

 

[norgeskog]

Hi Norg, I'm in Oregon as well and know what you mean about the recycling. I recyle everything as well, but on the rare occassion I have used oil, I try to find something to put it in.

I know it makes no sense...even as I type this I see the holes in my logic, but still can't help it.

p.s. to add to this kind of absurdity, sometimes I don't use my garbage disposal and go out of my way to take stuff out of it so I don't "over use" it. Makes no sense, but it's another one of my quirks.

hi htc, I do not have a garbage disposal, so do not have much choice. Fortunately I do not have much waste oil, only if I buy a pound of bacon which is not real often. Where in Oregon?? I am in Eugene. Alix's idea of putting it out for the birds is a good idea, we used to put suet out in the winter along with the bird seed, think I will do that next winter in my herb garden.

 

[htc]

Norg, I'm in Portland. I went to school for a couple years at UofO. Loved it there. My only complaint: no good Asian restaurants or Asian grocery stores, specifically Chinese/Vietnamse. Loved my time down there though.

 

[norgeskog]

Norg, I'm in Portland. I went to school for a couple years at UofO. Loved it there. My only complaint: no good Asian restaurants or Asian grocery stores, specifically Chinese/Vietnamse. Loved my time down there though.

htc, you should see it now. There is an Asian restaurant in nearly every block, new one just opened Sweet Basil and it is wonderful, on Pearl just above Broadway, up from Zenon. Two new, albiet small, Asian markets opened in the last year.