We've all heard of cleaning the loo with cola and polishing silver with ketchup. So what do scientists make of those old wives' cleaning tips?

• Does shining leather shoes with a banana skin really work?
• Are chopped potatoes a cheaper and quicker way to remove rust?
• FEMAIL puts old wives' cleaning tips to the test - with the help of science 

By Tanith Carey for the Daily Mail

Published: 19:24 EST, 29 April 2015 | Updated: 02:34 EST, 30 April 2015

Cleaning windows with vinegar and newspaper, getting rid of rust with a spud and using spit to polish. We’ve all heard old wives’ housework tips, but do any of them ever really work?

They’ve recently surged in popularity as people look to save money and use fewer chemicals in their homes. And with videos showing you how to clean your house retro-style sweeping the internet, I decided to put them to the test . . .

Old wives’ housework tips have surged in popularity recently as people look to save money and use fewer chemicals in their homes. Tanith Carey (pictured) puts them to the test - with the help of science

GET RID OF RED WINE STAINS

Old Wives’ Tip: As soon as you spill red wine, make it vanish by dousing the stain with white wine.

The Science: This appears to make scientific sense because red wine gets its hue from pigments called anthocyanins, compounds which give grapes their colour. When booze containing even higher concentrations of alcohol is poured on to the stain, the colours dissolve into the alcohol and the diluted solution can then be mopped up with a paper towel.

Vodka can help to lift red wine stains far quicker than the old wives' tip of using white wine

However, Declan Fleming, a school teacher fellow from the Royal Society of Chemistry, says purer, clearer drinks such as vodka — which is 40 per cent alcohol compared with wine’s 12.5 per cent average — will do the job better.

The verdict: It seems a criminal waste to pour good wine after bad. But to see if this old favourite worked, I dribbled half a glass of merlot on to an old cream carpet and followed it up with copious amounts to chablis. As I kept pouring, then soaking up the excess with kitchen towel, the deep burgundy patch gradually faded to light pink, but it certainly didn’t disappear.

But after pouring on vodka, the stain faded immediately — as if by magic. After a while, it completely disappeared.

To test it further on another red wine stain, I tried a generic £4.50 commercial stain remover. However, these tend to resort to using bleaching agents to take the colour out of stains. I found this to my cost when it seemed to strip all colour around the patch, leaving me with an unsightly white patch where the red wine had been.

5/5

VINEGAR FOR YOUR WINDOWS

Old Wives’ Tip: Vinegar applied with scrunched up newspaper is a cheap way to clean the windows.

When using vinegar to clean windows go for clear distilled rather than the malt you sprinkle on chips

The Science: This should work, says Mr Fleming. That’s because the main reason for streaks on windows is the calcium carbonate — or limescale — in rain. Vinegar is a diluted form of acetic acid and acid reacts with limescale to convert it into two things: CO2 gas, which escapes into the atmosphere, and water, which can be wiped away.

The verdict: The spring sunshine is showing up my streaky windows horribly, so I can’t wait to put this one to the test. I scrunch up yesterday’s Mail and douse it with clear, distilled vinegar before attacking the glass back door in the kitchen. From the start, I am astonished to see it cut through the cloudy streaks.

To compare, I clean the other side of the door with a commercial glass cleaner, again using a wad of newspaper so it’s a fair comparison.

But it feels like much harder work to shift the streaks and the glass does not look as sparkling.

This is possibly because the commercial product also contains soaps that could do with being rinsed off a second time with water.

In the home-grown version, any excess vinegar evaporates, leaving the glass transparent. The only drawback is you have to keep using new newspaper wads as if they get too wet they start to leave behind little remnants of newsprint.

Distilled vinegar works out at about 80p a litre, about a third of the price of a branded window cleaner. I’m very impressed by this tip.

4/5

POLISH SILVER WITH KETCHUP

Old Wives’ Tip: If you rub silver with tomato ketchup, the tarnish will come off and it will become shiny again.

The acetic acid (better known as vinegar) in ketchup is why people swear by it as a cleaning agent

The Science: Silver tarnishes when the sulphur compounds in the air react with it and form silver sulfide. The most likely reason some people swear by ketchup is because it contains acetic acid, better known as vinegar. Mr Fleming says: ‘There is nothing magic about the tomato. You would get the same result with any acid, even lemon juice.’

The verdict: I love cleaning silver as it yields such instant results. However, the thought of slavering the frames of my most precious pictures in ketchup is not appealing. When I reluctantly put this to the test, it only lightened the tarnish a bit.

Even more annoyingly, it did not clean evenly but left light pink patches where I’d first applied the ketchup. Plus, it was so sticky, the ketchup slipped between the frame and glass, almost staining my favourite wedding photo.

My £2.50 tarnish remover may not be as environmentally friendly as it uses more distilled chemically processed acids. But it cuts through the black build-up in a single sweep. So I’m afraid I won’t be putting tomato ketchup on anything other than chips from now on.

0/5

LICK AND SPITTLE

Old Wives’ Tip: Lick and spittle will polish or remove stains on everything from wine glasses to the silver.

Saliva contains an enzyme called amylase which breaks down starch in carbohydrate based stains

The Science: Saliva contains an enzyme called amylase, which breaks down starch in the mouth so they’re small enough to be absorbed by the body. So, the theory goes, it should do the same on food deposits on worktops.

The only snag, says Mr Fleming, is that amylase is only designed to break down carbohydrates. He explains: ‘Many hard-to-budge kitchen stains will be proteins or fatty substances. Greasy stains in particular will be better removed by the surfactants [substances such as soap] present in a cleaning spray as these help oils to form tiny droplets which can be carried away in water.’ Then there’s the fact that using spit is not exactly hygienic. Food safety and hygiene expert Dr Lisa Ackerley warns: ‘Bacteria, such as Staphylococcus Aureus, can be carried in the mouth and cause food poisoning if transferred to food.’

The verdict: Spitting on food preparation areas is the most disgusting suggestion I’ve ever heard.

Still, in the name of science, I scan my hob for baked-on stains, and spot one from last night’s shepherd’s pie. Hoping no one sees me, I spit on a piece of kitchen towel and get scrubbing.

I’m surprised to see the patch of mash — which is, of course, carbohydrate — quickly disintegrate. However, it’s a different story with hardened ketchup. This stain stays immune to my saliva, and I find it needs a bit more gumption in the form of my usual kitchen surface spray, to blitz it. The cleaner has a mix of ingredients to do the job: detergents, alcohol to kill bacteria and alkaline solvents to break up the grease.

My only has two ingredients: amylase and water. So, at around £2 a bottle, I think the shop-bought product is worth paying for.

1/5

COLA DOWN THE LOO

Old Wives’ Tip: Empty a litre bottle of cola down the toilet pan and leave overnight. The acid it contains, combined with the bubbles, will do all the dirty work and leave it gleaming, without so much as a scrub of the loo brush.

The bubbles, citric acid and phosphoric acid in cola are thought to be able lift dirt with no extra effort

The Science: Cola is fizzy because CO2 is dissolved in it under pressure and then released when you open the bottle. The idea is the bubbles will lift off the dirt without any elbow grease. Cola also contains citric acid and phosphoric acid.

But both are so diluted that it will never have the cleaning power of commercial toilet cleaner, says Dr Ackerley. What’s more, although these diluted acids will wash some bacteria away, they go down the bowl too quickly to remove it all.

The verdict: Once I’ve emptied the bottle down the pan, it looks revolting. Considering the cola instantly slides down the sides, unlike normal cleaner, which sticks to them, this does feel like pouring money down the toilet.

Yet, when I flush the bowl six hours later, it does seem whiter than usual — but perhaps only in contrast to its colour before.

There was none of the reassuring citrus scent I get from my usual loo cleaner, which made the bowl just as white when I compared them. Financially, using cola made no sense either. A litre bottle of Coca Cola is around £1.50. While a shop-bought loo cleaner is around the same price, it also contains thickening agents, which make it stick to the sides on the way down, giving it longer to clean up.

2/5

BANANA SKINS TO POLISH SHOES

Old Wives’ Tip: Use the inside of a banana skin to polish your shoes.

According to this old wives’ tale, banana skin shines shoes because it contains potassium

The Science: According to this old wives’ tale, banana skin shines shoes because it contains potassium. But, in fact, potassium is used for stripping down leather, not polishing it. Mr Fleming says: ‘Potassium is a vital mineral for humans and you might argue it could nourish the leather, but the leather isn’t alive.

‘The best you will get out of this is that oils from the banana skin provide a protective, water-resistant barrier in a similar way to wax.’

The verdict: In practice, this was a messy business, and my daughter Clio looked appalled as I left one of her Clarks shoes slathered with loads of stringy banana bits while I did the other in the normal way.

The skin also didn’t seem to polish it so much as make it moist. After I wiped off debris and gave it a buff, it did look cleaner than it did before. But the other shoe, cleaned with my £1 polish, came up with a brighter, waxy shine — without the sickly banana smell.

2/5

SPUDS CAN MAKE RUST DISAPPEAR

Old Wives’ Tip: Cut a potato in half, rub it over rust and watch it disappear.

Potatoes contain oxalic acid which reacts with rust to create soluble salts which can be wiped away

The Science: When iron gets wet it oxidises, producing rust. But potatoes contain oxalic acid, which reacts with the iron in the rust to make a compound called ferric oxalate. This dissolves in water and can be wiped off. Declan says: ‘The aim here is turning the insoluble oxide in the rust into soluble salts which can be removed. The potato is good because the oxalate traps the iron ions as if in a cage and makes the structure more soluble so they can be washed away.’

The verdict: I used a potato to scrub an old iron bowl left in the garden over the winter. Amazingly, it worked. With a little rubbing, it turned the rust into a dirty sludge which could be wiped away. The potato was easy to grip and kept producing plenty of juice. I then did the other side of the bowl with a commercial rust remover — which also uses acids to change the chemical structure and found it didn’t work a lot better even though at £4.50 it was more expensive.

4/5

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