Think about the foods you dump down your garbage disposal. Now think about all of those foods building up in there. Pretty gross, right? It's no wonder your disposal might start to smell after so many uses. Lucky for you, it's not too difficult to keep it clean.
It doesn't matter if you need to completely clean out your garbage disposal or just need to freshen up the smell; we've got you covered. So check out this list, decide which cleaning method is best for you and then get to work preventing your garbage disposal from smelling like a dumpster.
1. Baking soda & vinegar Since baking soda and vinegar can clean just about anything, it only makes sense to start with them. Pour 1/2 cup of baking soda down the garbage disposal and slowly follow it with 1/2 cup of vinegar. As this combination starts to fizz, plug in the sink stopper to trap the fizz in the disposal. After a few minutes, remove the stopper, run the disposal and turn on the hot water.
2. Ice & salt Even if you don't do much cooking, you probably at least have ice and salt on hand, right? Good, because they'll both come in handy for not only cleaning your garbage disposal, but also sharpening the blades. Fill the drain with 2 cups of ice and pour a cup of salt over it. Rock salt or coarse sea salt works best for this. Turn on the cold water and the disposal and leave them running until all of the ice is completely gone.
3. ToothbrushAfter you've cleaned the rest of your garbage disposal, you might still notice an odor. This is likely coming from the splash guard. The easiest way to clean this is to put a little anti-bacterial grease-cutting cleaner on an old toothbrush, pull up the splash guard and scrub the underside of it. Food tends to get caught under there, so this will help get rid of stuck-on gunk and the smells that come with it.
4. Citrus peels If the odor in your garbage disposal won't go away, try the peels from citrus fruit (oranges, lemons, limes, grapefruits). Just drop the peels into the disposal and let it run until it's finished grinding up the peels. In the process, your disposal will start to smell like fresh citrus.
5. Wire brush When no other method seems to be working, it might be time for a tougher approach. Start by turning off the garbage disposal and disconnecting the unit under the sink. Once you've taken every precaution to ensure that you won't lose an arm, squirt a little dish soap down the disposal and follow it with a wire brush. A few minutes of hard scrubbing should successfully clean out any gunk that you couldn't get rid of before.
6. Cleaning bombsFor those of you who like to get a little crafty, you might want to consider making garbage disposal cleaning bombs, which you can keep on hand for anytime it starts to stink in there. Mix 1 1/2 cups baking soda, 1 teaspoon liquid dish soap and 2 teaspoons sea salt. Pick your favorite scent of essential oil and add 20-50 drops, depending on how strong of a smell you want. Slowly add water until everything sticks together and then form balls out of the mixture. Place the balls on wax paper and let them dry overnight. Once they're dry, you can store them in an airtight container until you need to drop one down your disposal.
