B and I recently started making coffee in the mornings. After more than a year of being married, and having received a coffee maker as a wedding gift, we finally have started using it. And it’s great! B doesn’t have to spend $3-$4 on a Mocha each morning, and if I want, I can even add almond milk to a cup of mine. It’s been great – until we discovered that fruit flies love coffee grinds.

After a week or so of coffee grinds (and not too much else)  laying in our garbage, and a few nights not home, I opened the trash can and out flew a gazillion fruit flies. No exaggeration – there were literally a gazillion fruit flies that flew into my kitchen. GROSS! This was more than one week ago. And I haven’t cooked at home since then.  But today, they are all gone! How did I kill them all?

Vinegar and dish soap. I think there’s a saying about catching more flies with honey than vinegar but in my case, vinegar did the trick! Here’s an easy way to keep away/kill those pesky fruit flies by just using supplies you most likely have on hand in your kitchen.

A Recipe for Killing Fruit Flies (I know it’s not the usual type of recipe posted here)

Here’s what you need:

• 2-3 tbs of vinegar (I used red wine vinegar, but heard the cider vinegar works well as well)
• 2-3 drops of dish soap

Here’s what you do:

• Mix together vinegar and dish soap in a small bowl/jar.
• Set bowl near where the fruit flies have  been flying around.
• Wait and let the flies get attracted to the smell of the vinegar. They’ll likely fly around the area for a little while before actually diving into the vinegar. The dish soap helps catch them — vinegar alone won’t do the trick.

Before:

After:

Sorry for the gross photos. But you get the idea- it really does work! One week later and I’m pretty much fruit fly free.

My mom keeps a small glass of this concoction next to our fruit bowl at home.