My oven has a cleaning setting but the racks have to be removed and cleaned by hand. I have never liked cleaning the oven racks but do not like the look of dirty ones either.
So, I started cleaning the racks as I usually do — wet SOS pads and a lot of scrubbing. After cleaning the first rack, I rinsed it and determined that it was not as clean as I would like it to be but this was a LOT of work and was taking too much time.
Suddenly, a light shone from overhead (naw, just kidding, hahahahahaha) — an idea popped into my head. Why don’t I soak the racks in the bathtub? Hmmm … would it work? Well, it can’t hurt, I told myself.
So, I took the three racks upstairs to the bathroom, placed an old towel on the bottom of the tub so it wouldn’t get scratched, squeezed a bunch of Ajax Triple Action dish detergent in the tub (I hear Dawn works really well on grease also), filled the tub with hot water and put the racks inside one on top of another (making sure they were all covered with the soapy water).
Two hours later I came to check on the progress of the cleaning. I dipped my finger in the water and touched one of the racks with the tip of my finger to see if the dirt on it was soft. Boy was it ever!
I fetched a wash cloth and used it to gently remove the loosened dirt from the racks. Even the dirt in the hard to reach corners were easy to remove. Yes! Next, I drained the tub, rinsed the racks with clean water and placed them on a towel on the floor to dry.
That was it! So easy and simple! And to think how many times I had spent hours scrubbing the racks with SOS pads only to have a lot of the dirt still remain on them.
Here’s a look at how they came out:
Just like new! I hardly recognized them when I put them back inside the oven. What a simple and green way to clean oven racks.
(Oh – to avoid future spills in the oven, I placed a piece of aluminum foil on top of the bottom rack.)