Uses for coffee grounds

I have tried to find a use for things I would normally throw away.  Being a chef in Atlanta, I do that with just about every piece of food I make.  I can’t throw away food in the kitchen; I have to find a way to use it in my dishes. One of the things I  reuse in the garden is coffee grounds.  I use it in my garden because it’s easy to do! It also helps amend the soil and make it a little more acidic even though most of the acid as been removed by the brewing process.

If you don’t drink coffee and you need to add some coffee grind to your soil don’t fret. I have a great solution for you that will be inexpensive.

All you have to do is go to  your local Starbucks coffee shop and ask if they will give you some used coffee grind. They will happily give you pounds of used coffee grinds free.  At some locations in the spring, they will have the bags of used coffee neatly packaged in bins for customers to use at no cost.

Recently I planted  five new hydrangea and I used the 8 oz of used coffee grinds I had saved over the last couple of days.  Some of the flowers are a light pink but I think it would be pretty of have the flowers bloom in the color blue.  If the soil is acidic it will turn the blooms on the flower blue.  It was easy enough to apply.  I just sprinkled some of the coffee at the stem of the plant. I also put a tablespoon or too around the soil of other flowers in the garden as well.