Every Sunday, I make it a ritual to clean a few important items in our kitchen. One of the tasks on my list is to give our stove and sink a deep cleaning. A week of cooking can really make my range look bad, but my deep cleaning gives it a nice clean top for the week. I combine this with a clean sink and I feel like my kitchen has gotten some great refreshing.
I just have a standard gas range so my routine is for this. I can post some directions I found for cleaning other surfaces, but will use my stove for this example.
1. First, I fill a sink with warm soapy water. I place all of the burner pieces gently inside of the sink and let them soak while I clean the the top of our stove. At this point, you can also take the knobs off and let them soak too. Just make sure the knobs are in the off position and pull straight out to remove (Side note: It is also possible to put these items in the dishwasher, but I prefer to hand wash them because I think it is more gentle on the pieces)
2. I then take my spray bottle filled with my homemade all-purpose spray and spray the top of my range. I let this soak in for a couple of minutes while I work on other tasks around the house.
3. Once the cleaner has done its work, I take a soft damp cloth and wipe off the cleaner.
4. If there are persistent spots that won’t come up, you can try a couple of things to get them off. I pour a couple spoonfuls of baking soda on the spots and then make a paste out of this with a little water. Using the same soft cloth, gently try and get the stain up. If there is stuck on gunk, I take a different (but still gentle!) approach towards cleaning this. I use a Pampered Chef Scraper (if you don’t have one of these, an old credit card is great) for getting this off. The important thing is that you are gentle with your actions, so it doesn’t scratch up your appliance. Use the same gentle tactics on your glass oven door. I first try using my homemade glass cleaner. If that doesn’t do the trick, you can try and get the gunk off with your handy credit card or plastic scraper. Be very careful though- you want to keep your stove looking nice!
5. Next, I use my stainless steel cleaner on my stove with one of my microfiber cloths. I just spray my cloth directly (very teeny tiny bit) and then gently remove any fingerprints that might have taken up residence on my appliance. Remember to chant, go with the grain, go with the grain, go with the grain as you are cleaning.
6. Lastly, I drain the sink and give my pieces a good rinse with cool water. At this point, you can just let them air dry or you can give them a dry with a soft towel and place them back on the stove.
Cleaning Tips for Other Types of Stoves (thanks Martha!):
Stainless-Steel Cooktop Surface: Wipe with a sponge and a little dishwashing liquid or you can use a pr
oduct for stainless-steel cleaning. Be sure to dry thoroughly afterward with a clean microfiber cloth; otherwise you will have streaking. To remove stuck on gunk, soak the area with a towel dampened with hot water to loosen the material and then gently scrape with a rubber spatula.
Glass Ceramic Cooktop Surfaces: Wipe with a very lightly dampened cloth. This type of surface scratches extremely easy, in fact, even the gritty stuff that can get pushed around with a dirty sponge can cause damage. You have be really diligent to clean spills as soon as they happen. If spills do harden. You can buy special cleaners for this type of surface (available at your local hardware store). Remember to never slide pans or metal utensils across the cooktop.
Porcelain Enamel Cooktop Surfaces: Clean as directed above, but realize that the porcelain enamel can become chipped very easily. If it does get chipped though, you can camouflage damage with a little appliance touch-up paint.
Sound Off: Do you have any tips for cleaning your cooktops?
(For more great tips, visit Rocks In My Dryer)