Do your stainless steel pans have brown gunk that won’t come off as you wash it?
Or maybe after cooking, the food is stuck to the bottom of the pan.
I’ve been using stainless steel for years, and I’ve figured out how to get them clean.
Cleaning Stuck on Food
If you have food that is stuck to the bottom of the pan, scrap out as much oil, fat, and crumbs from the pan as you can.
Then turn your stove top to low and add a little water to the pan. Be careful as water and oil don’t mix. You should have gotten all the oil out though.
Allow the water to heat in the pan. The heated water will help loosen the food.
Use a flat wooden scraper to scrape the stuck on food.
Once the big chunks of food have been scraped off the pan, you can hand wash the pans. Let them cool completely before washing them.
Then hand wash your pan with hot water and dish soap. I always wash my pans last as they turn the water brown.
Cleaning Burnt Stains
Usually I only have to hand wash my pans.
However, every once in awhile I’ll get a little stuck on food that won’t come off just hand washing.
Here’s a pan that had a little stuck on food that wouldn’t come off with hand washing. It’s hard to see, but I circled it in the picture.
To get these burnt stains off your pan, you’ll need to use a powdered cleanser.
The two powdered cleansers I recommend are Bar Keeper’s Friend (affiliate link) or simply baking soda.
I’ve been using Bar Keeper’s Friend for years because it works wonders.
If you don’t have Bar Keeper’s Friend, you could use baking soda to create a gritty paste to help scrub the pans.
Whatever you’re using, sprinkle a little on to the pans and use a damp cloth to scrub in a circular motion.
I used baking soda this time to show that it works as well.
This will clean your pans right up!
If your pans are extra dingy, it will take some time to scrub. The bottom of my pan was really bad.
To get this burnt stains off, I wet the pan and then sprinkled a little Bar Keeper’s Friend on my pan.
Using a heavy duty scrubbing sponge I scrubbed in circular motions all over the pan.
It took me 5 minutes to scrub the pan. If your pans look like mine, you’ll need to be willing to invest some time and a little muscle into your cleaning.
Once I was done, I rinsed and dried the pan. It wasn’t perfect, but it looked so much better!
