How to clean a rotten food container without touching it
Containers forgotten for months fill with rot, sludge, and maggots, creating a mess that people cannot bear to look at or touch. To avoid handling the decay, they seek entirely hands-off solutions like running long dishwasher cycles or even burying the container in the backyard. This extreme avoidance leaves them wondering if these methods actually make the glass safe to reuse or if the container must be discarded.
What people tried
Every workaround mentioned in the threads below. We haven’t tested any of them — and nobody here is claiming they worked.
Found another way around this?
Share your steps and trade-offs so fellow engineers don't have to reinvent the wheel. No account required.
- 1Running the containers through a hot and long dishwasher cycleDid this help you?
- 2Boiling glass containers in a pot of water on the stove to sterilize themDid this help you?
- 3Throwing the container or plastic lid away out of cautionDid this help you?
- 4Burying the dish in the backyard to let the earth decompose the contentsDid this help you?
In their words
Unedited, grouped by where they were said, most upvoted first within each place, each linked to the thread it came from.
“I "accidentally" left boiled chicken in a glass container for a month in the fridge... maybe more than a month, idk.”source ↗
“I discarded the chicken now but I don't wanna throw away the container.”source ↗
“I just put both in the dishwasher on a 70°C (158°F), 2-hour cycle with dishwasher detergent. Would this be enough? Or should I discard it?”source ↗
“It's full of rot and sludge and covered in fruit fly maggots and eggs.”source ↗
“I really don't want to have to deal with it so, this might sound really stupid, I thought I could just bury it in the backyard, wait a couple weeks, and dig it up with the earth having taken care of the insides.”source ↗
“Is there an easier way without having to much touch or look at the mess?”source ↗
Where this came up
People with this problem also raised
- 7How to clean mold and swampy smells off a garbage disposal rubber flap
- 9Why does a spoiled food smell linger even after cleaning?
- 80How to clean burnt food off a stainless steel pan
- 4How to get freezer smell out of silicone
- 3Why do roommates put unwashed dishes on the drying rack?
- 4How to get toddler food puree and yogurt out of car seats