Proper disposal of used cooking oil/fat/grease

[pax]

You'd be surprised how popular a big block of frozen fat is with the birds. When cool, I pour it into milk or cream cartons, add some seeds, shake, and stick them in the garage where they freeze solid. When I feel like it, I put it out on the bird feeder and it's usually gone within days.

In the summer time it gets composted, which is exactly what compost people will tell you not to do. My feeling is I do not need my stuff to be done rotting in a big hurry so I throw everything biodegradable in there because it all breaks down in the end.

[sparrowgrass]

Please don't put any oil, cooking or automotive, into the storm drains. Those go directly to the nearest creek and eventually end up in the ocean. Not good for the birdies and beasties and little wigglies.

I suppose the best ecologically would be to save it in a jar or can and take it to your local restaurant and ask if you can put it into their waste fat collection.

[LVic]

No coffee cans or milk cartons in our house, only (narrow-mouthed) gallon milk jugs.

But we've found that the wide-mouthed carafes of Simply Orange o.j. are such good containers that we always keep an empty one in the pantry for any frying occasion (3-4 during Xmas and new years', when we engage in a sinful amount of torrid deep-frying!)

[flacoman]

I take it when it's still hot and immolate unsuspecting weeds!

After it cools , a fistfull of coffee grounds and grass seed

HTH

Jorge

[dougal]

The drain is a bad place for it.

It will compost, but the risk is attracting vermin.

It goes on a garden bonfire, and oil-burning stoves can be modified to use it.

In winter, wild bird feeding is a good idea.

But way better than sending it to landfill would be to make biodiesel from it, or pass it to someone that else that makes the stuff. Some local producers collect used oil from restaurants and take-aways. Here's one USA example (in Houston of all places) http://www.summitrecyclers.com/wvo_recycling.html Some may operate "drop off" schemes where non-bulk quantities can be accumulated for economical collection.

"Waste vegetable oil" itself, after progressively finer filtering and de-watering can be used as diesel fuel substitute/additive, even without the biodiesel conversion. This however is very dependent on the diesel injector design. Older, more agricultural designs fare better. Mercedes diesels over about a dozen years old are probably favourite! Using cleaned WVO as diesel fuel is best as a summer thing - cold, it doesn't flow so well and is a pain to start. Hence the marketing of 'conversions' that start the vehicle on fossil diesel, before changing over to WVO once the engine is warm, which in turn facilitates the preheating of the WVO so that it flows better through the injectors.

Making biodiesel from WVO is a much more benign process than ploughing up rainforest to make way for palm oil plantations.

http://www.greenhealthwatch.com/newsstorie...estructive.html

And its so much better than tipping an asset, quite literally, "down the drain".

[pax]

The drain is a bad place for it.

It will compost, but the risk is attracting vermin.

Making biodiesel from WVO is a much more benign process than ploughing up rainforest to make way for palm oil plantations. 

http://www.greenhealthwatch.com/newsstorie...estructive.html

And its so much better than tipping an asset, quite literally, "down the drain".

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Well, anytime you compost, you could get vermin. The key is to contain the compost in a safe place.

I have a Ford diesel truck and I just cannot bring myself to pour homemade fuel into it. I will pass this post along to my husband, Professor Flubber, and let him think about it. Maybe we could experiement with the tractor, which is a poc anyway and if it died, well, good, because then I can get a real dang tractor and stop dinking around with this one.

[Edward J]

Please, please, pretty please do NOT put FOGS (fats, oils, greases) down the drain.

True, you might succesfully flush it out of your home's plumbing system, but it will clog up the city's/municipality's main sewer system. These boys do not like this, and sewer maintenence/repair (huge list of demands from the Worker's Comp board about who and how many go down there, what type of equipment is to be worn, how many to stand by in case of emergency/pass out) is very costly. It is fairly easy to see which home's line that the FOGS comes from, and they will send a "snake" or cable equipped with a video camera head to inspect lines. Then they fine....

Best thing, according to many city officials--from health to plumbing to enviromental--is to pour the FOGS into a container and place it into the garbage. Alternatively you can find a used oil dumpster behind many restaurants and dump it in there where it willbe recycled.

[Magictofu]

You'd be surprised how popular a big block of frozen fat is with the birds. When cool, I pour it into milk or cream cartons, add some seeds, shake, and stick them in the garage where they freeze solid. When I feel like it, I put it out on the bird feeder and it's usually gone within days.

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I love the idea and will be improving my disposal technique starting tonight! Thanks.

[RAHiggins1]

I save large coffee cans and pour the oil/grease into it once its cooled and put it in the freezer until the can is full, then I toss it out with the trash but I'll be making suet since reading about it here. The exception being bacon grease, that goes in a bowl in the fridge to be used in something else.

[HungryC]

I take it when it's still hot and immolate unsuspecting weeds!

After it cools , a fistfull of coffee grounds and grass seed

HTH

Jorge

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Oh, man, this brings back memories. My grandma used to pour her used cooking oil onto weeds along the fenceline; it worked like a charm, though it will attract roaming neighborhood dogs.

I pour mine into the compost heap, but I have learned to dig down a bit before pouring it in, and then cover it well. Otherwise the yard cats think it's a snack and subsequently barf up greasy compost on my patio.

Pouring it down the drain will only make you the plumber's best customer.

Edited January 15, 2009 by HungryC (log)

[Beebs]

If it's only a little bit of grease or fat, I wipe with a paper towel and toss it in the bin. If it's a lot, I cool it in the freezer or fridge, then put it in one of those small plastic baggies that you get vegetables in and have absolutely no other use for (double bag it if there's a lot), then toss it in the bin. If it's oil, depending on how much I'm disposing, it either goes into a plastic baggy or a plastic container/can after it's cooled.

[Toliver]

I confess I usually just pour it down the drain and run hot water for a while until I'm confident it's all out of the system.

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The problem is that hot water doesn't stay hot for very long when it goes down drain pipes due to heat dissapation. This was mentioned in another eGullet discussion a while back. You end up down a length of the pipes with just tepid or cool water and grease/fat/oil. Not a good combination as mentioned by other posters.

My parents also drummed into me as a child to never put it down the drain. Always have a container handy and dump it ino the trash when it gets full.

[ojisan]

I save used cooking oil in a plastic tub for use as charcoal starter when I BBQ. Dampen a wadded up paper towel with oil and put under the charcoal chimney. Better than plain newspaper as there is no ash or burnt paper residue.

[slkinsey]

You know... it's so rare that I have enough leftover cooking oil that I had to think about what I do with it. I guess that the few times I have more than perhaps a tablespoon of leftover oil to discard (which does tend to go into the drain), I tend to have a lot of leftover oil because I've been making fried chicken or latkes or something. That either goes into a container and into the trash or, if it's still in decent shape, filtered back into the container and saved for reuse in the next frying project.

[Magictofu]

Degreasing stocks or even stews produces quite a bit of grease.

[slkinsey]

If it's relatively clean beef fat or chicken fat from stock-making, I'm likely to filter and freeze it for future use.

[judiu]

If it's relatively clean beef fat or chicken fat from stock-making, I'm likely to filter and freeze it for future use.

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Oh, yeah, potatoes fried in beef fat So good I can hear my arteries hardening from here! Then again, latkes fried in schmaltz with onions sounds awfully good, too!

[lapin d'or]

I never deep fry so left over grease tends to be from cooking meat or roasting veggies and all this gets fed to the birds.

Large amounts of beef or lamb fat are allowed to set in lumps and get put on the bird table. Smaller ammounts of these or softer fats such as pork, chicken get mashed up with the cheapest porridge oats I can buy and again put out on the bird table. I have found that wiping out a warm roasting tin with cheap dusty porridge oats is a very good way to clean up the pan. The fat gets soaked up and the birds get a great treat.

Tiny amounts of fat just get wiped up with a paper towel which is composted.

I have been kept entertained by a huge range of birds visiting the garden this winter, even the woodpecker eats fat when it is really cold.

[dougal]

...

I have a Ford diesel truck and I just cannot bring myself to pour homemade fuel into it. I will pass this post along to my husband, Professor Flubber, and let him think about it. Maybe we could experiement with the tractor, which is a poc anyway and if it died, well, good, because then I can get a real dang tractor and stop dinking around with this one.

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Let Google be your friend

for example: http://vegetableoils.blogspot.com/ (Virginia-based)

[Marlene]

I have a thing called a fat trapper container. I pour my grease into that the throw the bag out when it's full. Deep frying oil generally goes back into the now empty container from whence it came, and then gets thrown out. I don't ever pour grease down the sink.

My husband did that once. The plumbing bill was $500.

[Peter the eater]

My municipality does curbside "green box" collection every other week. The box is big enough to conceal a large adult. In it goes:

* Fruit & vegetable peelings

* Table scraps, meat, fish, bones

* Dairy products

* Cooking oil & fat

* Bread, rice, pasta,

* Coffee grounds, filters, tea bags

* Eggshells.

* Boxboard & Soiled Paper (cereal, shoe, cracker & cookie boxes)

* Paper towel rolls

* Food napkins

* Paper towels and soiled paper

[prasantrin]

This topic has been covered a couple of times here and here.

I use a Japanese product called katameru tempuru which is powder that you add to oil to solidify it. I prefer it to pouring oil in milk cartons or jars because those things can be recycled, and I like to recycle as much as I can. I've never seen it available in Canada, but I've never looked, either. I might have to bring some back with me when I move back.

[prasantrin]

I have a thing called a fat trapper container.  I pour my grease into that the throw the bag out when it's full.  Deep frying oil generally goes back into the now empty container from whence it came, and then gets thrown out.  I don't ever pour grease down the sink.

My husband did that once.  The plumbing bill was $500.

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I looked up fat trappers, and I think I want one. How similar are the bags to airplane barf bags? The replacement bags are about $1 each, but if I were to store up barf bags, I could just use those in the container!

[Marlene]

I have a thing called a fat trapper container.  I pour my grease into that the throw the bag out when it's full.  Deep frying oil generally goes back into the now empty container from whence it came, and then gets thrown out.  I don't ever pour grease down the sink.

My husband did that once.  The plumbing bill was $500.

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I looked up fat trappers, and I think I want one. How similar are the bags to airplane barf bags? The replacement bags are about $1 each, but if I were to store up barf bags, I could just use those in the container!

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Sort of similar. The fat trapper bags are foil lined and they are very heavy duty. They don't leak, and I can put a ton of oil/fat in there before I throw them out. I started using them when we got the RV and then took that one to the cottage and got one for home after hubby's incident.

Frankly, you could probably line the container with a heavy duty ziplock bag or some such. I like this thing, because it lives under my sink, out of the way,and holds a lot of fat.

[prasantrin]

Sort of similar.  The fat trapper bags are foil lined and they are very heavy duty.  They don't leak, and I can put a ton of oil/fat in there before I throw them out.  I started using them when we got the RV and then took that one to the cottage and got one for home after hubby's incident. 

Frankly, you could probably line the container with a heavy duty ziplock bag or some such.  I like this thing, because it lives under my sink, out of the way,and holds a lot of fat.

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I hold a lot of fat, too. . .

I'll look into them next time I'm in Canada, and in the meantime, I'll start hoarding barf bags (they don't make 'em like they used to, though. They're awfully thin now!). Even if they don't end up working out, barf bags are always useful!