Black tea is a tasty, uplifting beverage, but it also has other uses around the house. If you’ve got hardwood flooring, you can put together a large batch of black tea to use for cleaning and disguising scratches. It’s one of many floor-cleaning hacks we’ve loved over the years—but it really withstands the test of time because it’s so simple and effective.
How to clean hardwood with black tea
Ashley Poskin gives the rundown of using black tea for your floors at Apartment Therapy. All you need to do is bring a half gallon of water to a boil on the stove and then steep eight black tea bags in the water for 10-15 minutes.
Squeeze out any water from the tea bags, and let it cool to room temperature; then, grab a rag and apply a small amount to your floors. The tannins in the tea can enhance the warm coloring of the wood and help hide small scratches, plus black tea derived from the Camellia Sinensis plant contains polyphenolic compounds that prevent microbial growth.
Be sure to sweep or vacuum the floor before you begin to wipe it down, and test it on a small, inconspicuous spot on your floor to make sure it looks how you want it to.
What you need to clean floors with black tea
To do this, you do need tea—and more of it than you might have on hand at any given time. Here are some bulk-buys of tea to consider, plus other tools that will help you get those floors gleaming:
Pick up a good broom to sweep up any debris that might keep scratching your floor before you dive in on the scratches themselves. The Kelamayi broom and dustpan set ($26.99) is perfect and well-rated on Amazon, as it even features a little comb that gets the dust and nastiness off your bristles and into the pan.
If you need eight bags of tea at a time to do this, you need a lot of tea in general. Try 200 bags of Lipton for $18.36 or 70 by Whole Foods for $6.99.
Finally, pick up a dozen microfiber cloths for $13.99 to use for the actual wiping. A dark color like the gray ones here is perfect if you’re worried about staining.