There seem to be an insane number of articles on the net telling me to use my old corks to make a noticeboard, a trivet, to cover my walls, or make a cork wreath. Why on earth would I want a cork wreath?
I don’t want to do any of that because I have a sense of aesthetics, but I also don’t want to throw them all into the bin, so I’ve had a think/research, and come up with the following things that they are actually useful for, and that don’t offend my eyes.
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Cook an octopus – Controversial this one, a lot of people, including a number of proffessional chefs will tell you that it works, and a lot of others will tell you it’s complete bollocks.
The theory is that if you throw a cork into the pot when you are boiling squid or octopus, it helps to tenderise them and helps prevent them from going rubbery.
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Make a stew – In exactly the same way as above, some people claim that if you throw a wine cork or two into a stew when you are cooking it with cheap cuts of meat, and it will help the meat to tenderise.
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Give them to your cat – It’s hardly a great way of recycling as ultimately you still have the same cork later, but I have never met a cat who didn’t love playing with wine corks.
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Use them as drainage – Chop each cork into a couple of pieces and put them in the bottom of plant pots to act as drainage.
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Compost them – Whole corks will break down incredibly slowly, but if you chop them up into small pieces then you can throw them into your compost bin with no problem.
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Clean a knife – If you have high carbon kitchen knives then it is easy to scratch them by using an abrasive cleaning pad. You can avoid it by putting some washing up liquid on a cork and scrubbing them with that instead. I know it sounds weird, but it works!
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Start a fire – Keep old corks soaking in a jar of rubbing alcohol, or other highly flammable liquid, and then you can use them as firelighters to get nice and toasty in the winter, or get a summer barbecue going nicely.
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Stop oil burning – I have no idea of the science behind this, and I haven’t actually tried it yet, but I have read the same thing in a few different places. Aparently, putting a cork into a frying pan will raise the burning point of the oil. Anyone tried it?
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Make a fishing float – Pretty self explanatory really, isn’t it.