Cleaning Your Oven with Baking Soda

A step by step guide to cleaning your filty dirty oven using just soda bicarb and water! Bicarbonate of Soda is what we in the UK call what you in the USA call Baking Soda!

My oven had about 5 years of grime and carbon build up inside it and I admit to not having cleaned it. Mainly because I hate the smell of those powerful chemical oven cleaners and also because I hate the thought of the toxins that might be released into the atmosphere. However I recently switched to using eco products and found the brilliant properties of Soda Bicarb are brilliant for cleaning oven interiors.

Yippeeeee!!!!

Get a new or well washed out spray bottle about 500mls

Mix up 3 heaped tsps of soda bicarb in 500mls water.

Pour into spray bottle and shake.

Spray this solution inside a COLD oven on the floor and shelves ( on sides if its not a self cleaning sided one) . I spray every morning.

Then you use your oven as normal to cook dinner- don't worry the soda bicarb is harmless

Then when oven is completely cold, spray it again the next morning (I usually do it when I'm waiting for the kettle to boil at breakfast!)

Then use again as usual

You continue this cycle for a minimum of 4 weeks weeks more if its knee deep in black stuff!

You'll start to notice bits of black falling off the shelves after a couple of days! So if cooking chips or roast potatoes I'd pop them on the top shelf!

The bottom of the oven will start to look bubbled and disgusting (more than it does already!) and I mean seriously disgusting.

The wet soda bicarb breaks up the carbon sticking to the sides and base of the oven. Just keep on spraying baking soda on to the black gunk between use until it is all gone from the shelves.

Its important to hang on in there as its an accumulation of soda that does the job. If like my cooker the base is caked on with cheese and other crud then sprinkle ( I used a sieve!) soda bicarb on the base then spray with water. You can also make a soda bicarb paste and paint it on.

The trick is to keep repeating the action daily until the carbon is gone. It all sort of accumulates on the floor of the cooker and then you can wipe it off in one go. I'll tell you though its bloody disgusting when it comes off as it looks like tar! But hey its so worth it!

You can see the bubbly effect on the floor of the oven where the carbon is accumulating.

This is the result just after a month later! I am amazed that I didn't need to take a scrubber or sharp knife to get the stuff off the bottom or the shelves. I can't see why anyone in their right mind would even consider buying toxic oven cleaner products when with a little patience you can achieve the same results for pennies!

Note there is still a small area of black still left but I intend to continue the process on that bit. Then regularly spray to maintain the cleanliness.

Another bonus of Soda Bicarb is that it's a natural odouriser too!

Don't be faffing about with those little tubs of soda bicarb from the supermarket. They are not terribly cost effective. Wikaniko sell decent sized boxes.

Lemons can help to maintain your now clean oven .

Method:

Cut a lemon in half and squeeze out the juice into a pyrex (oven proof glass) bowl. Pop the remains of the lemon in with it. Add water until the lemon is covered. Put it into the centre of the oven.

Turn oven on to about 180 degrees until the lemon water begins to boil. Then turn the oven down very very low for about 20 mins. Keep a careful eye on the bowl as you don't want it to dry out completely. When there is very little water left, turn off the oven.

When the oven is still warm, but not hot ( we don't want your burning yourself!) you can wipe out the insides with a damp cloth as any grease splatters should now be softened.

So there we have have it. Perfect oven cleaning using soda bicarb, water and lemons. Cheap effective and eco friendly!

Yoorah!!!!

If you don't fancy the spray method try this

Another way that some of my friends have cleaned their oven was to mix some soda bicarb and water into a paste and 'paint' it all over the grime in the oven. If you leave it for about an hour the bicarb reacts with the carbon and softens up making it easier to remove. This is fine if you just have some minor spillage in the oven but if its anything like the terribly disgusting excuse for an oven that I had, you'd be better off with the spray version!

Don't forget that whichever way you clean your oven, remember to spray regularly to keep the carbon devils at bay.

Don't you just love eco friendly ways to clean? I do!