My Oven Cleans Up Its Act

I made some pizza the other day and some grease from the pepperoni leaked through the pan.  I was using one of those pizza pans with the holes in the bottom, which made me wonder if a crispy crust was really worth the burnt pile of smoking grease that now resided in the bottom of my oven.  The glass door was also disgusting.  Allow me to show you.  

It was high time to clean out my oven, especially since it's something I haven't ever done.  I didn't want to use any toxic oven cleaners, so I did a bit of research to find the best natural oven cleaner.  Website after website claimed all I needed was baking soda.  It sounded simple enough, so I thought I would give it a shot.

  

Adding a little water to a bowl full of baking soda made a paste, which I then smeared all over the inside of my oven with my hands after removing the oven racks.  Most of the websites recommended letting the baking soda paste sit awhile, so I decided to let it sit while I made dinner.  I made a delicious Pioneer Woman dish for dinner.  Spinach Artichoke Pasta might be my new favorite recipe because it is easy to make and delicious!

After dinner, I got busy scrubbing the inside of the oven.  I poured a splash of vinegar on the baking soda paste just to give it a little extra oomph.  Jazzy had to come check out what was going on, but quickly lost interest.  

It would have been nice to have a helping paw, er hand, for scrubbing.  I used a Mr. Clean Magic Eraser and that worked pretty well on the oven itself.  It looked a heck of a lot better after the scrub down than before.  There was, however, a few tiny black spots that wouldn't go away no matter how much I scrubbed.  But the grease and baked on food spots on the glass door weren't going anywhere!    

So I decided to try putting a thicker coat of baking soda paste on there.  After letting it sit for about 20 minutes, I tried scrubbing it clean again.  I tried using a washcloth this time.  I could get the grime off but it was slow-going and used up lots of elbow grease.  It's a good thing I hadn't done my nails recently because they were a mess by the time I was finished.  I wasn't scrubbing so much as I was using my nails over the washcloth to scrape off the gunk.  Eventually I got the glass cleaned and I felt quite accomplished.

The racks didn't have much to clean off of them other than a few spots.  I used the Mr. Clean Magic Eraser and some vinegar to clean off those spots.   

While my oven doesn't look brand new, it is certainly in much better shape!  Good luck if you plan to tackle your own oven...and wait to get a manicure until after you are finished.