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Cleanser recipes save green while being green

JANESVILLE — Let’s start with a couple of facts.

First, our grandmothers didn’t need 75 products to keep their homes clean. They didn’t obsess about fresh-scent carpet cleaners, room deodorizers and anti-bacterial everything.

Second, modern marketing types have convinced us “going green” costs more because we’re saving the earth.

Hooey, as my grandmother used to say.

The best way to keep your home green-clean on the cheap is by investing in our foremothers' favorite cleaning ingredients such as washing powder, liquid soap, borax, and vinegar.

First, head to the public library and check out “Better Basics for the Home: Simple Solutions for Less Toxic Living” by Annie Berthold-Bond. Or, buy the book for $18.95. You’ll recover the cost in savings on cleaning products.

And you’ll be saving the earth—seriously.

Berthold-Bond’s book contains 868 recipes for everything from all-purpose household cleaners to laundry products, toothpaste, body creams and lawn and garden products.

“Better Basics” is the best of the “green household” books. The cleaning recipes are simple and made from ingredients you can find at the larger grocery stores. Best of all, Berthold-Bond gets right to the point without moralizing, showing she understands that families want answers, not another lecture.

With that in mind, here are a few cleaning recipes that have worked reliably in my home.

All purpose cleaner: At my house, this cleaner is used practically everywhere—only wooden tables and mirrors are spared. This is because I’m lazy and cheap. Sure, I could mix up the basic formula for antiseptic all-purpose cleanser or the mildew remover or the soft-soap-like cleanser, but that would require about three more minutes, and I prefer to spend as little time as possible doing housework.

Berthold-Bond recommends the all-purpose cleaner for countertops, baseboards, walls and fixtures. Washing soda can scratch fiberglass, so beware.

Here’s another disclaimer: If you have fancy-pants kitchen and countertops, check the manufacturer’s recommendations for cleaning before using any products.

1/2 teaspoon washing soda

2 teaspoons borax

1/2 teaspoon liquid soap or detergent

2 cups of hot water

Combine soda, borax and soap in a spray bottle. Pour hot water on it. Put lid on bottle and shake until the dry ingredients dissolve.

Be sure to shake until dissolved or else the undissolved powder will clog up your spray bottle.

Two cups equals 16 ounces, and since I use a 32-ounce spray bottle, I double the recipe.

Soap and vinegar: Berthold-Bond, who is probably not lazy, uses a soap and vinegar mix in bathrooms because it’s easy to rinse off and the vinegar helps fight mildew and mineral buildup in the shower.

1/4 cup liquid soap or detergent

1/2 cup white distilled vinegar

2 gallons of water

Combine ingredients and stir. Wearing gloves, saturate a sponge with the mixture, wring out the excess liquid and wash the area. Soak the sponge frequently as you go. Rinse well.

For this story, I experimented with Berthold-Bond’s recipes for basic soft scrub, floor cleaner and a variety of her recipes for bathroom cleaning, including the borax easy clean and the hilarious toilet bowl sizzler, which is a must for households with kids.

They work.

Now for the math.

After a laborious process involving figuring out how many ounces were in a half-teaspoon of borax, I discovered my basic cleanser came to less than 15 cents for a 32 ounce bottle.

Borax is $2.69 for a 32-ounce box or about 8 cents an ounce. Two teaspoons is one-third of an ounce, making it about 2.6 cents.

Washing powder is $2.49 for 55 ounces, or 4.5 cents an ounce. One-half teaspoon is 1/12 of an ounce, making it … wait, I’m too lazy to do that math. Let’s just round up and call it 1 cent.

Some of the recipes call for essential oils such as tea tree oil or lavender oil. A small bottle can range between $8 and $10, but most recipes call only for a small amount—between three and 10 drops.

Essential oils can be found at Basics Co-op, 1221 Woodman Road, Janesville. Woodman’s also carries a small selection of essential oils.