Today’s Thursday Thriftiness is on an easy way to clean plastic straws – those reusable plastic straws – shake, sippy, water bottle, curly – any reusable straw. They’re really hard to get clean. And should you think yours are getting clean by simply washing them the traditional way – they aren’t. I am choosing to highlight shake straws for the purpose of this writing because they are used every day in our home.
These straws come in the covered cups I buy for my son. I also confiscate these straws when we are at Friendly’s if they happen to come with any of our beverages – I’ve paid for them right? So why not take them home and reuse them? I have quite the stash, so I can get away with washing them the traditional way and then set them aside for a deep cleaning.
I promise you that washing plastic straws such as these the traditional way does NOT get them clean. They may look clean – but they really aren’t, as you’ll see in the last step. If you put the beverage in the fridge with the straw – you’re doomed at being able to get the build up out of the ridges the traditional way (take a look at the first picture below. You’ll see build-up in the ridges from my son’s LNA’s not taking the straw out and washing it out before putting the cup with the straw in the fridge). Even if they are washed out – a build up occurs on the inside of the straws – you just don’t notice it until you’ve deep cleaned them.
In this picture, these straws have been washed in dish detergent and had water run through them. Notice the clearer straws – you can see gunk in the ridges despite being cleaned (the traditional way).
You can enlarge that picture – simply click on it. Were you able to see that nasty gunk? Some of straws have gunk from flavored milk, others from juices. Disgusting huh!?! Don’t fret though! They can be saved!
