During that time, I came back to check on them like a contestant on The Great British Bake Off nervously watching their bread rise and stirred them up a bit to make sure every inch of fabric was evenly treated. In total, I think I left them in the water for about three hours - I have since reduced the time to about a half-hour and seen similar results. Because I’m impatient, I filled a plastic laundry tub with scalding-hot water, dissolved a heaping scoop of Sonett, and added my shirts. But if you don’t want to wash your clothes in really hot water, you can soak them overnight. The hotter the water you use, the faster Sonett will work. When I got home, I read the instructions and set about soaking a beloved but sweat-stained Jesse Kamm white button-down and a few T-shirts that had seen better days. Since I’ve never once regretted a Coop purchase, I figured this was a safe enough bet and dropped it in my cart. But how would it stack up against my dingy white T-shirts, the yellowing collar of a gray hooded sweatshirt, and a pile of formerly bright white towels? It’s also gentle on fabrics, okay to use with a septic system, and color-safe, whereas chlorine bleach is not. Like a lot of other cleaning products, it uses oxygen (released when the powder is dissolved in water) to break down stains, so it’s especially effective at getting rid of oxidizable stains like fruit, wine, coffee, tea, grass, and blood. The word bleach in the name put me off at first, but I was reassured when I read that the powder formula is 100 percent biodegradable, made from organic and wild-growing plants without any petrochemicals, and is even hypoallergenic. And then one did.Ībout a month ago, I was standing in a very slow line at the Park Slope Food Coop, aimlessly reading the names of every tincture and tonic, when my gaze stopped on this little tub of organic bleach complex from the German company Sonett. So for about a year, I have been casually looking for an ecofriendly bleach alternative - basically hoping that a miracle product would present itself to me. I could just bleach all my white laundry, but I’ve been making an effort to reduce the amount of chemicals I pour down the drain. But while I’m okay with perspiration as a concept these days, I’m still annoyed when my crisp white tees and button-down shirts start to look yellow and dingy. Over the years, I have learned to deal with it by addressing the anxiety in therapy and remembering that everyone gets embarrassing pit stains from time to time. I’ve been an anxious sweater since high school.