Clean Green With These Holiday Kitchen Cleaning Tips
Here at Zerorez® Tucson, we like to keep things as green as possible. So what if there were some ways to deep clean those pesky areas of your home without the use of harsh chemicals and cleaners?
Now we may be just floor cleaners in Tucson , but we know a thing or two about cleaning green in the home. From your floors to your stove and oven, and more, you’ll have your home sparkling and full of holiday cheer when you Clean Green With These Holiday Kitchen Cleaning Tips:
Stove Top Gunk
Start your holidays off right with a clean presentable stove top. Everyone and their mom is going to see it (literally) so let’s make sure it’s ready to go shall we?
Stovetop gunk- you know what we’re talking about don’t you? That thick black layer of greasy-looking gunk that’s just been caked-on and cooked-into your stove top?
Most of us use household cleaners, a little scrubby sponge, and do our best going to town on that stuff. It’s good enough, but it doesn’t get it all off, right? What if there was an actual solution that would rid that stovetop gunk forever?
Well, we’ve found it!
Hydrogen Peroxide and Baking soda have just become your new best friend, even for the real old, caked-on greasy delights.
Make a simple paste out of 2 parts hydrogen peroxide, 1/2 part baking soda, and 1 part dish soap! Pull out that handy dandy scrubby sponge or some steel wool, some rubber gloves, and watch the stovetop gunk easily disappear.
You can use the same mixture to soak and scrub the drip pans and the underneath of your stovetop “hood” so to speak.
It’s magical.. just like the holidays will be with your fresh stovetop!
Green-Cleaning The Oven
Speaking of stoves, your oven could probably use a little TLC too huh? The holidays are perhaps the most vital time of the year to have a clean and good-working oven.
Between the turkey, ham, casseroles, and pumpkin pies, your oven is your best friend during the holidays- best to give it the best present ever, a deep cleaning.
Haven’t you noticed it’s coated in the same greasy gunk as your stovetop?
We’ve got a solution for that too my friends, and it will be the second time today that you say “I love baking soda”.
Step one: First, you’ll want to remove the racks from your oven. Then, do a quick wipe of your oven with a wet washcloth, just to remove any visible debris or burnt on remnants inside the oven.
Step two: Now, spray the interior of the oven with water in a spray bottle. Don’t be shy, you want the inside of your oven to be generously soaked.
Step three: After which you can quite literally dump a bunch of baking soda inside your oven, covering all the surfaces you can with a thick layer of baking soda. You may need to apply more water if it’s not soaking the baking soda well.
Depending on how gunky your oven is, you’ll want to let the baking soda sit in there for anywhere between 15 minutes to overnight…
If you intend on leaving the baking soda on for a longer time, you’ll need to periodically check and re-soak the baking soda with water. You want the baking soda to be visibly wet, so apply more if it looks too dry.
You’ll notice after a while that some of the greases are lifting as your baking soda begins to change color from white to brown. Yuck! That means it’s working woohoo! You can spot test periodically with a sponge to check on the more hard-to-clean areas.
Step four: Once you are satisfied with the lifting process, you can remove all of the baking soda, but leave just enough to scrub with a sponge and some water to get off the rest of the nasty gunk in there.
Dishwasher TLC
With the holidays coming up, a solid working dishwasher is pretty dang important. No one wants to do all of those dishes by hand, am I right?!
When was the last time you gave your dishwasher a deep cleaning? Does that seem like a strange question perhaps?
You might be thinking, “Weell, it’s a dishwasher, doesn’t it naturally clean itself?”
Well sure, but have you ever cleaned out the steam vent in your dishwasher? What about the filter at the bottom? Yeah, about that…
Step one: Throw on some gloves and hop to, soldier! Let’s start by cleaning out the filter at the bottom of the dishwasher- and wear gloves because it’s going to get gnarly down there.
The cover should come off pretty easily with the removal of a screw or just a little leverage of a butter knife. But don’t force it- it will be easy to pop right off if it’s meant to. Clean everything out well and replace the cover.
Step two: The steam vent… dun dun dunnnn!
This is typically located on the door of the dishwasher. You’re going to want gloves for this task as well, my friends. Often, this piece is filled with nasty stuff and can cause leaks if the water is not able to drain properly.
The cover on the inside of the door should be easy to remove with a butter knife. Again, don’t force it- it will be easy to pop right off if it’s meant to. Clean everything out well and replace the cover.
Step three: Last but not least, you’ll want to do a normal cleaning in the dishwasher just like you would clean anything else in your kitchen- a little water, a sponge, and some baking soda. This will help with any stains or hard water spots.
After you’re satisfied with the scrubbing process, you’ll want to run the EMPTY dishwasher with a 1/2 cup of our Zerorez® Tucson Powered Water®. This helps to give the dishwasher a thorough rinse and clean without any dirty dishes to worry about.
Here are some photos to help you figure out where the filter and steam vents might be on your dishwasher!
Lemony-Fresh Microwaves
Ahh, just the sound of that makes us happy. A lemony-fresh microwave? Uh, yes, please!
While holiday cooking primarily consists of ovens and stoves, the microwave does occasionally have its place!
Start by fill a glass microwave-safe bowl with 4 cups of hot water. Cut up a lemon and place the chunks in the bowl.
You’ll want to set the cook time on the microwave long enough so that the water starts to boil over. Once the water has boiled, cancel the cook time, but keep the microwave door closed for about 10 minutes so that the steam inside the microwave has time to dissolve some of that grime and grease.
You can use a sponge or a washcloth to clean the microwave tray and wipe the inside of the microwave out! Waa-laa, a lemony-fresh microwave just in time for the holidays.
Shiny Stainless Steel
Everyone loves a good sparkle to their kitchen appliances and what better time of year? But how does one do this in a “green” way?
Once again, your friend baking soda has come to save the day, only this time he brought his friend vinegar to the kitchen cleaning party.
Make a paste out of 1 part white vinegar and 1/2 part baking soda. Rub that all about your stainless steel appliances- the kitchen sink, stove, refrigerator, whatever it might be- and let it sit for about 15 minutes. If it’s a little grimier of a surface, you’ll want to let it sit for long, just as you did for the oven cleaning portion of this article.
Once it’s had adequate time to process, go ahead and take a sponge to it and finish off the polishing.
Keep a Bottle of Powered Water® Handy
While cleaners and detergents seem to be the answer to everything, it seems baking soda is, at least for deep cleaning! But guess what else does too?! That’s right- our patented Zerorez® Powered Water® solution!
Don’t believe us? Give it a shot!
Our Powered Water® solution can do everything we talked about in this blog today- the stovetop gunk, the oven, the microwave, the dishwasher, AND of course, the stainless steel.
In fact, we suggest keeping a bottle of our Powered Water® handy as your everyday cleaning solution.
This joyful bottle of cheer will be your lifesaver for any accidents and messes that might appear during your onslaught of guests.
Not to mention it makes for about the most fabulous countertop cleaner- no matter if its granite, marble, quartz, tile, or plastic-coated!
Powered Water® can be used as a regular cleaning liquid for your countertops/tables, bathroom cleaning, floor mopping, and even for stain cleaning in case grandma spills another glass of wine this year!
You can avoid all the mess and stress that comes with cooking the holiday meals this year - you can clean as you go.
Normally when you make a mess during cooking, you would use a wet sponge or paper towel to clean up the mess (or you leave it until you’ve finished cooking).
Well, having Powered Water® handy as your cleaning liquid during cooking is ideal- because it’s non-toxic! You don’t have to worry about it being near food or little ones getting their hands on it because it’s completely SAFE!
Combine our Powered Water® with some paper towels and it’s practically the quickest picker-upper on the planet right now (besides your dog).
Kitchen Floor Cleaners in Tucson
Well, we’ve covered all of our bases in the kitchen cleaning department have we not? Oh wait… we forget the largest surface of all in the kitchen.. the floors of course!
As floor cleaners in Tucson, we know that while everything else in the kitchen gets deep cleaned before the holidays, the kitchen floors are often forgotten.
Perhaps the thought of having to deep cleaning your kitchen floor right before the holidays is simply too much to bear. You have enough to worry about and clean before the day arrives!
No need to worry, if you live in the area then you have access to the best floor cleaners in Tucson around! We’ll have your floors transformed from naughty, to nice, just in time for Santa to slide down the chimney with a sack full of gifts!
We hope you’ve enjoyed these Green Holiday Kitchen Cleaning Tips with Zerorez® Tucson. They’re sure to have your home holly, jolly, and sparkling just in time for the season!
Happy Holidays from the Zerorez® floor cleaners in Tucson. We’ll be anxiously awaiting our sleigh-ride over to your house this holiday season!