Tips to Cleaning Kitchen Appliances that You Might Not Think About

It is never a bad time of the year to deep-clean your kitchen. The kitchen is the center of a household, where people gather, chat, work, eat, and even play. In 2014, a study indicated that, on average, Americans spend 37 minutes a day just prepping, serving, and cleaning up. That doesn't include eating, hanging out, doing homework, or just chatting. Needless to say, the kitchen gets a lot of use, and it often needs a deep cleaning to remain sanitary, smell fresh, maintain appliance performance, and look great.

Here are a few appliances that you should clean pretty often (that you might not be cleaning enough), and some tips on making it less of a chore and more of a natural habit!

• Refrigerator - you should every month, or every other month, remove everything from your fridge and wipe down the inside with a warm cloth and baking soda. This helps clean up all of those leaks and food spills, as well as gives you a chance to check for, and throw away, expired foods. When its time to put everything back in, try not to stuff your fridge. You need room to let cool air circulate, which keeps food at a safe temperature. These items also absorb warm arm from when you open the doors, so you want to make sure to not leave your fridge too empty. There are specific spots and shelves for certain types of foods, so please check your owner's manual for optimal storage spots for different food types in your refrigerator.

• Garbage Disposal - this is an appliance that you might not think about very often, but it without a doubt needs attention! Every day the garbage disposal gets used and over time it can start to smell (gross!). But what to do about it? There is a simple way to clean and deodorize your garbage disposal: cut a lemon into wedges, drop a few tablespoons of salt and a few ice cubes into your disposal and let it rip! The lemon deodorizes and the salt and ice clean the food residue that has built up. This should be done monthly.

• Dishwasher - another appliance that is often overlooked is a dishwasher, and that is usually because its purpose is to clean, so isn't it essentially self-cleaning? Not exactly. Your dishwasher is subjected to food scraps from your dishes and over time germs build up inside of the machine, which is not only bad for your health but can reduce the efficiency of the machine. An easy way to clean your dishwasher is to pour two cups of white vinegar into a dishwasher-safe cup, place the cup upright on the top shelf, and run on your hot water cycle. After that is done, deodorize your washing machine by sprinkling a cup of baking soda at the bottom of the tub and run on a half cycle of hot water. Afterward, leave the dishwasher open for a few hours to air out. Try doing this bi-monthly.

• Coffee Maker - what would we do without our beloved coffee maker? While you clean out your coffee maker after every use, at least once a month it should be deep-cleaned to remove hard-water minerals from its inner workings, which can reduce efficiency and change the taste of your coffee (oh no!). Time to break out the distilled white vinegar again, this time filling the machine's container with a half/half solution of vinegar and water. Place a filter in the machine and brew the solution halfway. Turn off the machine, wait 30 minutes, then brew the other half. Once that is done, pour out the solution, replace the filter and run clean water at least two times through the coffee maker. Voila, a thoroughly cleaned coffee pot! Time to celebrate with a hot cup-o-joe!

This is obviously not a complete list of kitchen appliances, but it is a few that you use on a daily basis that you might not be cleaning enough. Often times in our busy lives, we overlook these things, and then we push their deep-cleaning off until another day. Hopefully, these tips help you to clean them more often.

Need a hand with your cleaning this year? Give Dirt Divas a call at (609) 601-0841 today for a no-obligation home and office cleaning quote!