Test Kitchen Tuesday

Happy Saturday, Friends!

No links this week, but, with it being the weekend, I do have a cleaning tip for you. Somehow this post has been sitting in my drafts for a while, and magically posted itself and then unposted itself a while back. The magic of the internet and my clumsiness with dates may have had something to do with that.

Anyway…

Last year, I treated myself to a matching set of pots and pans. We had never had a full set that matched – just a hodgepodge of things we’d acquired over the years when the need arose. I wanted a grown up set of pots and pans, so I bought Cuisine Art set made of stainless steel.

And, they’re great. Except for one tiny little thing. They tend to be hard to clean if you’ve made something like eggs, sautéed onions, or anything that can turn brown and stick. I have a little trick up my sleeve I thought I’d share for those in the same boat.

If you have never tried Oxi Clean, you should! It is a fantastic cleaner in a whole bunch of different applications. Turns out it is good on pots and pans, too! I stumbled on this little bit of cleaning wisdom entirely on accident. One day, when I scooped out some Oxi Clean to add to a load of laundry, I thought, ”what if…” and as it turned out, my “what if” worked.

How to Clean Stainless Steel Pans in a Jiffy

This is part chemistry and part cleaning, so: Please. Be. Careful. There. You have been warned! (Bold + Underline = I’m serious!)

1. Here we have our dirty pan. It isn’t that bad as cooked on items go, but it would take some scrubbing in the sink.

2. Fill the pan with about 1 inch of tap water, and bring to a rolling boil. The boiling alone will loosen up some of the baked on food.

3. Carefully and slowly, pour about a tablespoon of Oxi Clean into the boiling water. Have your free hand on the temperature knob and be ready to turn down the heat if you need to.

The reaction when the Oxi Clean hits the pan is sort of a foaming action, and it will rise up a bit, depending on how much you add. Start small to get a gauge for how much you need, and add more once it resumes boiling if you need to. If you add too much initially, you’ll have your own version of one of those soda pop/Mentos volcanoes on your hands.

4. I usually let the foam rise up to within a half inch of the rim of the pan, then turn the heat down to low and let it simmer for about 5 minutes

5. Turn off the heat and let cool for 10 minutes or so, then wash as you normally would. For really baked on/burned pans, you may have to repeat the process.

The end result is so clean you can see my reflection in the pan!

This works well on pots, too. In fact, I used this method just the other day to clean off burned on beans in a stock pot. I had set some pinto beans to boil, walked away, and totally forgot about them until a couple hours later. Eeek! But, the Oxi Clean worked its magic just as it always does.

I hope you enjoyed that little tip. And if you use it, remember my warning – start small and be careful so as not to end up with an Oxi Clean volcano on your stove!