What to do with coffee grounds
 

I always just throw out my coffee grounds, in the filter. They go straight into the garbage can. recently, I found out that someone I know places them in a ziploc bag, zips it, and then places that in the garbage. Someone else dumps the grounds down the sink, rinses the filter, and then places the filter in the garbage can.

I've been tempted to save them when I'm planting things, but I usually just pick up a bag or two at Starbucks and use those.

What do you do with coffee grounds?

With Nespresso , we return the capsules to them .

The rest ( meaning not Nespresso ) is fertiliser , supposed to be , for our plants .

Compost. The gardens at the back of my house all link up and there are compost heaps I can add the used coffee to (my husband uses a V60 filter and I use the little Aeropress discs - which turns coffe grounds into a super convenient puck). Otherwise there is a weekly collection of household organic garbage by our local council, which is where the stock bones go.

Good thing I have lots of garden - a lot of it in natural, semi-forested state, o dump the grounds the Miele coffee machine produces, as well as copious amounts of tea leaves from our daily afternoon tea (4 tsp = 1/4 - 1/3 cup of leaves).

That is said to be an excellent way to clog up your drain pipes.

We have a superautomatic, and the grounds go down the drain daily as we rinse the removable parts from the coffee maker. Lots of water (from cleaning the machine) and I usually run the disposer for several seconds.

I was also told not to dump coffee grounds into the sink. When the weather is nice, we dump it in random places in our garden. Otherwise, it just goes into the trash. (We use a re-useable gold filter for our coffeemaker.)

I didn't think it was a good idea, but it's not my house, so I'm not about to interject my thoughts there.

Exactly the same as you do. If there are any pesky grounds stuck to the filter after dumping in the garbage, I'll rinse those few in the sink with a lot of water.
I'm curious, were you able to find out the reason for the ziploc bag method?

The reasoning for the ziploc bag method is so that moisture from the grounds doesn't get into the garbage and potentially leak.

Compost but in a compost bag for the Recology collectors to fetch when they get the green - blue - black bins. Grounds and coffee filter (no K cup)

maybe one day I’ll figure out how to just do our own garden compost :-)

I put them down the waste disposer, not having a garden. The Ziploc bag thing sounds like an environmental disaster if everyone did it.

I would agree that it's an environmental disaster, but apparently, she doesn't care.

I compost them, but now we’re both working from home we’re going through a kilo every 10 days, my wife is worried it’s unbalancing the compost. So we’re putting some directly into the flower beds in the garden.

Basically putting a small plastic bag of garbage inside a big plastic bag of garbage! The neighbor may have a hundred little ziplocs in every trash bag if she does that with everything that's a little wet. Now, maybe she accumulates it all in the same ziploc every week and throws it out once per week. Obviously, I'm still trying to wrap my mind around this :).

I just dump them and the paper filter in the trash. They will degrade in the landfill most likely. My mom used to compost hers but stopped composting when she opened the container in her kitchen to add something and discovered maggots.

Sounds like a great way to create more waste. If one's garbage bags are leaking, then either buy better bags that don't tear or be more careful about throwing away sharp, pointy things.

Yep. Tons of ziploc bags in her garbage bag.
I would agree with buying better or different garbage bags.

Once a week we'll dump the grounds directly in our potted plants. They seem to really like it. (Maybe they're just caffeinated.)

So environmentally damaging and what a wasteful use of plastic

Consider vermicomposting
 

You can feed coffee grounds to your worms if you get into worm composters (vermicomposting): Vermicomposting coffee grounds

My wife washes her hair with them and uses them as an exfoliant. I put them in my roses. For those who put them down the drain, your plumber thanks you.

That's a new one...she washes her hair with coffee grounds?? What is that supposed to do? And if she is washing her hair with them, aren't they going down the drain when they get rinsed out? Your plumber thanks you too!

The way to deal with potential leaks in your garbage bag is to use a second bag as a can liner. As long as your bag doesn't leak, you don't replace it. Separately bagging wet trash items, at least in my house, would mean I'd have a yeah bag full of baggies.
As for coffee grounds, using a gold filter and emptying it onto a sheet of paper towel which gets tossed works pretty well.

agree- dry them, mix with coconut oil and make a body scrub

I’ve never directly washed my hair with them but caffeine is purported to make hair grow thicker/stronger

The ground goes in my garden (spread thin) and the filter goes into the compost. The soil in my area is highly alkaline. The acid in coffee ground is good for it. Also, coffee ground supposed to repel snails. Haven't have snails in my garden for a few years. Not sure if its because of coffee ground or because general reductions in bug/inset populations. The garden seems to like it.

I place the grounds in potted plants out side so that the neighborhood cats won't come near them

I agree, although she's obviously not concerned about it.
Interesting. I've never heard of washing one's hair with coffee grounds.
I don't worry about leaks in my garbage bag.

I mix crushed egg shells (air dry them and a quick run through a pestle and mortar) with the coffee grinds and sprinkle it in my garden. It cuts down on the acidity a bit and the plants seem to like it. The filters get air dried and tossed into the green bin. Interestingly enough, the tomatoes and raspberries seem to like the mixture a lot as the plants grow back bigger every year.

I have a small bin under the espresso machine for grounds, and when full I alternate between a compost pile in my yard, and a compostable goods bin (picked up by WM). Before I had compost I just trashed it. I don't see it being good for the pipes although I don't fret if some end up down there from a drip tray.

what would occur if you didn’t rinse the egg shells?
my spouse won’t let me try putting any compost into our garden area so I’m loving this thread while having limits of what I can do.

garbage can.... but then again I only ever drink just one cup a day

I'm not sure. I don't usually rinse the shells, I have a small plastic takeaway bowl that I toss the shells in when I use eggs. They usually dry out overnight. There might be some leftover egg white in the shell, but not much. Then I just toss them into the mortar and when I have some time, I just grind the shells and pour into a bag. The coffee grinds (don't have often as I don't drink a lot of coffee, but I do get them... I also mix tea grinds as well) need to be dried as well. Then starting in the spring, I have plenty of material... I just mix in handfuls of what I have, then sprinkle in the garden and the lawn. The lawn doesn't like it as much, but this usually gives me some pretty nice tomatoes and lots of raspberries.

One thing about the tea and coffee grinds... when you're drying them out, you have to spread them out and I would recommend setting out a fruit fly trap nearby. Doesn't happen often, but occasionally you get large numbers of fruit flies.

What are you growing in your garden? Coffee grounds might not benefit everything.

good point. Only real thing is a Meyer lemon tree. Nothing else has had success except different plants. We tried Apple trees. I still think about scallions and onions. Ooh maybe today I’ll sweep up the leaves.

Scallions don't need a lot of space. If you have a reasonably good condition topsoil, you're good to go. Just stick the white end in and prune as you eat. I use an old recycling tub and snip 2-3 stalks a week to add to whatever I'm cooking.

Bitter melon seems to take the mix pretty well. Although I've only done it one season. Might have to try some other veges.

(I'm having an easy day today... not usually online this much)

Well a Meyer lemon tree is a wonderful thing to have. I mooch lemons (Meyer and Eureka) from friends & luckily they have plenty to share. I love them.
There are lots of veggies that are very easy to grow if you use them a lot. Herbs are pretty easy too.

They do like an acidic soil.

Must be the robusta variety. As the old saying goes, "puts hairs on your chest" (or chest on your hairs).

So, does your plumber thank you? When your wife washes her hair, they don't dissolve, do they?

They do (tomatoes) but I never expect the plants to survive the winter and to grow back bigger every year. I'm not complaining as it's free ingredients. But it's something interesting to see.

Must have indeterminate tomatoes. Surely not outside? Post a photo. If you have found a perennial cultivar of tmato, you cold make a fortune.

The other stuff your plumber, or at least the power drain snake business thanks you for is rice, pasta, tea, (saturated) fats and anything else that swells in water and is sticky.