Saturday Cleaning

Since I have retired, I really do not have a household cleaning schedule, not that I really ever had one when I was working.  Usually, things got done as they needed to get done, not because it was Tuesday, or Wednesday.

So, there is no such thing as Saturday cleaning around here.  But, I was invigorated today.  Actually, it was just a great improvement from being so wiped-out yesterday; even my yoga instructor commented on how tired I looked.  But today I left yoga class like a new woman.  And so I decided to clean the oven.

Well, to be honest, it requires that I close the door and push a button.  But when I removed the racks, I realized that I would actually need to do some real cleaning.  Amazing what cooking a turkey at 400 degrees can do to an oven.

So, I went online to find a way to clean the racks.  There was the ammonia in the garbage bag overnight method, the Easy-Off spray on the racks and the garbage bag overnight, and the bathtub method.  I chose the bathtub method.

I threw an old towel in the bathtub, splashed in some laundry detergent and four dryer sheets and filled with hot water.  I put the racks in and waited for the water to cover them.  I just checked them after two hours and surprisingly enough, they are getting clean.

But what I learned most from surfing the Internet is the idea that I should only put the rack in the oven that I am going to use.  Granted that for Thanksgiving I had two racks in the oven at various times.  And I use all three racks when I am baking batches of cookies.  But usually, I am only using one rack.  So why am I leaving in racks that will just get dirty?  DUH!!!

Once I get these cleaned, only one is going in the oven.  The other ones will go in the tray cabinet along with the never used broiler pan.  And the next time I clean the oven, I'll only have one rack to clean.  My thanks to whomever it was that mentioned this idea.