Tea Tuesday: Four More Unconventional Tea Bag Uses

We’ve told you in an older post how you can creatively use your leftover coffee grounds and tea bags, instead of tossing them in the trash bin. Today we’ve got another edition of eco-friendly methods to infuse new life into those tired tea bags. Tea bags actually contribute fifteen hundred tons of waste to landfills each year, so it’s worth exploring these uses. 1. Eliminate Bad Breath Black and green tea are both surprising remedies for halitosis, better known as bad breath. Black tea reduces plaque formation, and kills the bacteria that cause bad breath. Similarly, the antioxidants in green tea, called polyphenols, destroy a number of compounds in the mouth that are responsible for causing bad breath, tooth decay, and even mouth cancer. How can you utilize these teas correctly to treat your halitosis? Simply make a decoction of tea by dipping the tea bags in a cup of hot water. Then, drink the tea a few times over the course of the day. Used in tandem with regular brushing of the teeth, tea can help improve oral health. 2. Make Your Hair Shine If you have darker hair, green tea can give your hair a fresh, glossy look. The staining properties of the tea enhance your natural hair color, and the caffeine content in black and green tea is also said to enhance the curl in natural hair. This caffeine also reduces hair shedding by blocking the hormone responsible for hair loss. Add a few tea bags to boiled water, and let it steep for a few hours. After you shampoo your hair, pour the tea on your hair, and let it sit for about half an hour, and afterwards, use the conditioner of your choice. Be careful using tea rinses on lighter hair, as it can cause discoloration or darkening. 3. De-grease Dishes When you’re washing dishes in the kitchen, you’ll come across some particularly stubborn grease stains on some dishes, even after a run through a cycle of the dishwasher. Did you know that tea can be an effective remedy for this problem? Soak the dish overnight in hot water and a few brewed teabags, and the tannins in the tea will break the grease down by the morning. 4. Flavor Your Meat When meat is not prepared properly, it can turn out to be bland and unappetizing. Tea bags or leftover tea leaves can be used to marinate your meat. The sweetness of the tea and tannins will add a savory dimension of flavor, and make it a wonderful tenderizer. Marinate your meat in strongly-brewed black tea for several hours or overnight before roasting or grilling. Can you believe how many uses there are for tea bags?! Add this list to the one we shared with you earlier, and start experiment with tea bags in your own home. If you have any unique tea bag uses that we haven’t mentioned, we would love for you to please share them with us here. For all of your tea and coffee needs, please visit us today at CoffeeAM!