At the Davis Food Co-op, there are many designs of kitchen towels! Or buy some pretty fabric and make some yourself! Stick to 100% cotton or linen to ensure that they are commercially compostable once they’ve run their course. 

Carry a cloth napkin with you! Then you can avoid paper napkins when you get takeout or during your lunch break!

Making your own Rags

Materials:

  • Old Cotton Shirts
  • and/or Old kitchen towels
  • Good scissors
  • Needle or sewing machine and thread (optional)

Hold onto your old 100% cotton T-shirts and cut them into rags! Old kitchen towels that are stained also make great rags! Start by cutting off the sleeves and cutting out any seams. The best rags are 6-8 inch squares. Start by making the larger rags, and use the sleeves and odd spots to make small rags. Do not worry about making every rag a square, these are not for show and any shape will do! The small rags are great for small messes and for cast iron care!

Use up the whole shirt! There is no need to cut off the bottom hems.

Cut your kitchen towel into 2 or 4 rectangles, depending on how big you want them. it is nice to have a variety of sizes! Use your needle and thread or sewing machine to hem the edges. Fold ¼ inch of each side in and use a simple stitch to hold it in place. A zig-zag stitch will work the best to stop strings and runners from coming loose. 

Two rags from one very old dish towel. I folded the raw edges over and used a cross-stitch on my sewing machine to keep it from fraying.

Tips:

  • Keep a separate bag for dirty rags. The rags are often covered in oil from a cast iron, dust from the bathroom, and various kitchen messes that you do not want staining your clothes! Once your stack is running low, it is time to wash them all including the bag! 
  • The great thing about using cotton, if you ever clean something that seems to gross to keep the rags, toss them in your city compost bin! 

Why this Makes a Difference

More than 13 billion pounds of paper towels are used each year in the USA. At the Davis Food Co-op alone, 4,491 units (single rolls or multipacks) of paper towels were sold in 2019. Rags are a great way to limit or completely stop your need for paper towels!