Household Tips
StainsCleaningLaundryKitchenDampDIYPestsOrganisingKnow what your surfaces are made of, store food where it actually keeps, and remember that anything whose job is to make heat is the expensive thing in the room.
The kitchen is where the most expensive cleaning mistakes happen, where most household food waste is created, and where a small amount of technique saves a lot of money. It is also where most of the running-cost questions come from, which is why the calculators are linked from here.
What it covers
Every tip in kitchen
Keep it in a bread bin or a paper bag at room temperature, never in the fridge. The fridge is the fastest way to stale bread there is.
Bread, potatoes, onions, garlic, tomatoes, unripe fruit, bananas, honey and olive oil. All of them are damaged by cold in one way or another.
Soft herbs go in a glass of water like flowers, loosely covered. Salad leaves go in a box lined with kitchen paper, which absorbs the water that makes them slimy.
Cover the burnt base with water, add a good spoonful of bicarbonate of soda, and simmer for ten minutes. Most of it will lift off with a wooden spoon.
Hone it with a steel every few uses to straighten the edge, and actually sharpen it on a stone or with a pull-through two or three times a year.
Put a damp cloth or a sheet of damp kitchen paper under it. It takes three seconds and it is the single best knife-safety habit in a home kitchen.
Cool it fast, refrigerate within two hours, reheat once only, and get it piping hot all the way through. Rice is the one that catches people out.
Tipking is general household information, not professional advice. Test anything on a hidden patch first. Full disclaimer.