In my opinion, freshly grated cheese is always going to taste better than buying the shredded variety. Although the DIY option undeniably makes everything from pasta to nachos taste so much better, the grating process can be messy and time-consuming, and sometimes it feels easier to just go with the more convenient option. Thanks to a brilliant hack shared on Instagram by The Dad Briefs writer Slade Wentworth, however, everything we thought we knew about grating cheese may be about to change.

In the short video, a plastic zip-top bag is fitted over the bottom section of a cheese grater. He then begins to grate his cheese, using the bagged grater atop a cutting board. When done grating, Slade then lifts up the grater and all the cheese drops directly into the bag. That means no mess to clean up and no time spent gathering all that cheese from the cutting board into a bag. The entire process is streamlined and leaves you wondering why you weren’t doing this sooner.

This easy grating process is wonderful in several ways: It eliminates the mess, makes it easier to store extra grated cheese to use again later, and saves us from taking the easy way out by buying the more expensive and less appealing grated cheese at the supermarket. So if you ask me, this is one of the most useful hacks of the holiday season — especially if you plan on serving plenty of cheese.

The theory behind this hack also makes me wonder what else we can be grating with this process. Wouldn’t grating cabbage for coleslaw or prepping potatoes for hash browns work by the same logic? I don’t know about you, but I can’t wait to find out.

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