Post 185  

Vinegar Orange Cleaner Recipe

Vinegar is such a great all purpose cleaner;  it is non-toxic and vigorous in stripping grime and food from any kitchen surface or hard wood floor. Vinegar doesn’t smell good unless I am thinking salad, but it doesn’t leave a smell behind, it just evaporates into a fresh smell, the same as when you use a vinegar finishing rinse in your hair.  I can honestly speak to scented cleansers, they actually don’t smell good to me, I just think they stink, like fake-scented candles. These smells become offensive when you get away from them long enough. A dryer sheet for softening clothes, who likes the smell of these? Obviously a lot of people, but me, I think these stink too and just thinking about the chemicals being deposited on clothes I put on my body is repulsive to me. You may think I am extreme but I think I am sensible.

Over the past years, myself and hundreds of my customers, spend time searching the internet, Pinterest, and sharing with one another, perfect non-toxic recipes for soaps, body butters, candles, lotions, and cleansers. Some of these recipes are just too much for many to pursue but others are incredibly simple. The Vinegar-Orange-Peel Cleaner is an example of a “too good to be true” story. I thought the first time I made this, “I’ll make this but it won’t really be THAT good, it’s just vinegar and besides, I like foam– it probably too good to be true that it really works”.

Surprise surprise, LOVE this cleaner. I think you will too. The perk?  You have to eat more oranges to make this cleaner! I eat the little bitty ones, they are  SO easy to peel and we eat them every day now. It started out that we ate them every day so we could make the cleaner, now we eat them and have to make the cleaner because we can’t throw them out. Orange peels look like a cleaner to me now and to throw them out would be like throwing out a perfectly good product, so the end result?  We make it and end up giving it away to people in mason jars just to use them. Everyone wins in this one. Orange oil is a great cleaner and conditioner. By extracting the peel into the vinegar, you have an exceptional second cleaner in your product that makes vinegar smell good. The oil in orange peel is such a great floor conditioner too, so if you have hardwood, this is a good spritz to swiffer your floors. So, let’s make it!

What You Need

Quart Sized Mason Jar with lid

Orange Peels

White Vinegar

Spray Bottle

Optional:  a few drops of natural liquid dish soap or castile soap for degreaser benefit

Fill the mason jar about 1/2 full with plain white vinegar. As you eat your oranges, simply put the peel into the jar. I add peels until the jar is peel-saturated, pushing the vinegar up to the rim. Add more vinegar if needed. The more peels you use, the stronger the cleaner. To make this more efficient, use a lot of peel because after it is made, you can dilute it when ready for use. I use a lot of peel, so when I strain off the vinegar, I will fill the spray bottle about half way with the concentrate and then fill the rest of the bottle with more white vinegar. You determine the strength that you want by how many peels you add the jar. I make mine extra strength because it takes up less room in the refrigerator and by overfilling I get two spray bottles of cleaner instead of just on.  It really only takes a couple of full sized oranges to make 1 quart of cleaner.

If you want it sudsy, add a few drops of natural dish soap or liquid castile soap to the mix. Don’t use much, just a little and it gives it an added punch if you want it. By using just a few drops, it doesn’t leave a residue. If you have a residue, you used too much, just reduce it next time or dilute down your cleaner with some more vinegar.

Allow the Vinegar-Orange-Peel Cleaner to steep for 2 weeks. I don’t put mine in the fridge, but others do. I cannot tell the difference. After two weeks I strain off the finished product and store the prepared cleaner concentrate in the fridge until I need it. This has about a 6 month shelf life. When in the spray bottle for use, it is not necessary to refrigerate it and it can be kept in a kitchen cabinet for convenience. Just store your Peel-Vinegar mix in the fridge for later use once cured and strained.