Here’s a better way to dispose of used cooking oil

Oct 21, 2023

Don't pour it down the drain. Instead, transform it into a congealed disk that you can toss in the trash.

A little oil left over from frying your breakfast eggs can easily be sopped up with paper towels or an upcycled cotton rag. But some recipes—hello, doughnuts!—leave larger quantities of oil behind.

As an author and blogger focused on greener living, I often hear from people striving to reduce their impact on the environment. Household waste, including used cooking oil, is a big piece of that puzzle. So I was naturally intrigued when I heard about so-called cooking-oil solidifiers, a product touted as a solution to the waste oil dilemma.

To study the problem and possible solutions, let's return to that panful of oil.

Depending upon what was cooked, you can reuse the oil a few times to make the most of it.