Woman struggling to remove spaghetti sauce stains from plastic container tried viral cleaning hack — the results astounded her

Most people appreciate a good kitchen hack that makes their life a little easier. One such hack related to removing stains from a plastic container left a woman on TikTok in complete shock. Every person who has used a plastic container to store food with oils and sauces might know that it can be a nightmare to get the stains off. But a simple hack involving paper towels and dish soap can do the trick without relentless scrubbing and wasting time. Taryne Renee, who goes by @taryne_renee on TikTok, wanted people to explain how such a trick could work.

Renee remarked that she really needed someone to explain the science behind the hack to her like she was five years old. "I never understand how this works," she began. "I just microwaved some pasta and it's tinted orange," the woman shared as she showed the plastic container she had used. She explained how the container had already been washed once with her scrubber brush and soap but the stains simply wouldn't come off no matter how hard she washed it. "It's like permanently on there, right?" Renee remembered how she saw this hack on TikTok where one has to wet a paper towel and put some dish soap on it. "I did not believe it at first either," she said as she folded the towel once with some liquid soap and put it in the container.

"You just stick it inside, put the lid on and then you literally just shake it," Renee instructed. She shook it vigorously as the paper towel started bunching up and cleaning the container from every single corner. One could see that the paper had turned orange and the container was almost clean. The woman shook it a little more and all the stains were gone. "How? How!" she exclaimed as she showed the now clean container to people. "Like how does a bristle brush with soap on it [doesn't work], but then you do the paper towel thing and then wash?" The towel had soaked up all stains, leaving the box as good as new.

"I lost sleep over this. How does it work? I want someone, I need someone to [explain it]." The video received more than 3 million views and over 298,000 likes. People took to the comments section of the video to share how the hack might have worked according to them. @hot_graham wrote, "The oil basically gets into the 'pores' of the plastic. Scrubber just pushes it in further. Soap releases it and the paper towel, being more 'porous' than the plastic, absorbs it."

@slimmigs7 commented, "The molecules wanna stay to the polymer, aka plastic of your Tupperware or whatever, but the dish soap helps break it down with the velocity of the water or whatever?" @emiliano_2_33 remarked, "The soapy thing breaks the oily thing down and the towel absorbs it. The scrub just kinda smooshes the oil around. It works best with warm/hot water." @robertmcdonald551 shared, "It’s chemistry. That brown stuff is oil-based on plastic. A brush will not clean it. It will just spread it around."

You can follow Taryne Renee (@taryne_renee) on TikTok for more lifestyle content.