Here's What You Can Clean In Your Kitchen With Just Vodka

Forget spicy bloody marys, sweet cosmos, and creamy pasta sauces; it's time to take your bottle of vodka to the next level, removing it out of the bar cabinet and popping it into the cleaning drawer. Vodka has more to offer than its intoxicating properties — it moonlights as an excellent cleaner that can spruce up your kitchen in a jiffy. 

From getting rid of stubborn grease on your cookware and tackling stubborn cooking oil spills to taking care of that sticky label residue and doubling as a disinfectant, there's plenty of reasons to consider keeping a bottle of vodka on hand, even if you don't drink it.

Vodka works much like vinegar around the house and can be used to clean just about anything that you'd otherwise scrub with the latter. But where vinegar is known to leave a pungent stench that can linger for hours, you won't have to worry about the unsavory smell after cleaning your kitchen with the more neutral vodka. Besides, you don't even have to splurge on a pricey bottle to do the job. Leave those for the bloody marys and cosmopolitans and instead look for the cheapest vodka to get scrubbing with in the kitchen.

At its most basic, vodka can be used like any other multipurpose cleaner to wipe down surfaces in the kitchen — think counters, cabinets, and drawers as well as appliances, taps, and sinks. Vodka will make your chrome kitchen sinks and faucets shine, and it's gentle enough to be used to scrub countertops and backsplashes made from marble or granite, when it's diluted with water. 

As a bonus, vodka is also a disinfectant, which means it can get rid of germs and bacteria on frequently touched surfaces such as handles and door knobs or things like chopping boards after they are used to prep raw meat. The only catch here is that, for vodka to act as a disinfectant, its ABV needs to be higher than 50% — or 80% if you want it to kill any viruses that may be hiding in your kitchen.

While vodka can easily be used on its own to wipe down your kitchen, it's also possible to make the liquid more powerful with the help of a few extra ingredients. Mixing vodka with equal amounts of lemon juice, twice the amount of white vinegar, and a few drops of soap will boost the alcohol's cleaning potency. Alternatively, you could also infuse vodka with orange and lemon peels to give the spirit (and your kitchen) a sweet, floral aroma.

Vodka can take care of ridding general dirt, dust, germs, and bacteria, but it can also do so much more. Vodka is an excellent degreaser that can take care of slick residue plaguing your appliances, counters, and cookware, or even oil splatters on kitchen walls. You can use the vodka as it is or dilute it with equal amounts of water and spray it all over your stovetops, range hoods, and ovens. You could even leave vodka on the greasy area for 20 or so minutes before you scrub it off for extra-stubborn stains. Similarly, vodka can get rid of grease on plates, glasses, and cookware (simply add a splash of vodka to the soapy water in your kitchen sink before giving them a good soak).

The clear spirit can come to the rescue of another messy problem, too: red wine stains! Spray neat vodka over the stain, dab it with a dry cloth, and then a wet one to do the trick. And, if you're struggling to remove the labels stubbornly clinging onto shiny new cutlery, vodka can come to the rescue for that purpose as well. Just dab a cloth soaked in vodka over the sticky label, wipe it a few seconds later, and the label should come right off. Once all that cooking and cleaning is done, you can even blend vodka with essential oils to keep your kitchen smelling fresh.