Summer Is Coming! Get Your Grill Ready
Written By James Morgan
There would be fewer complications with grills wearing out if people were thinking of their grills in the same way they think of their stovetops. Consider this: once you've cooked anything on the stove, you usually have to clean up the spills.
You should clean your entire grill more thoroughly every once in a while, based on how often it is used. Getting everything out of the grill and wiping around and under the burners are all part of this process. A grill should be treated in the same way as a stove. Keep you BBQ clean after every use. Let's see some of the tips that will help you clean your grill this grilling season:
Why is it necessary to clean your grills on a regular basis?
Nothing like a home-grilled supper cooked right in your own garden. The more you grill, though, the more you’ll need to clean and maintain your grill to get the greatest results.
Here are a few reasons why it’s important to maintain your grills clean:
1. Remove Carcinogens that Have Built-Up
Even if you scrape your grill after each use, carcinogens can accumulate on the cooking grate over time and be transferred to your food during the cooking process, posing a health danger. Cleaning your grill is one of the most efficient ways to remove carcinogens from your grilled meals, so make sure to scrub it completely after each usage.
2. Longevity of Clean Grills
A grill is a big investment, and if you don’t clean it regularly, you might have to replace it sooner than you think. Cleaning your grill and grill grate on a regular basis will keep it in tip-top shape, ensuring that it will last years longer than if food particles, rust, or sauces are left to sit without being scrubbed away. You can achieve better grill marks with a clean grill.
Before using your grill for the first time, coat the grates evenly with a high-heat cooking spray like canola oil while they are still cold. After that, turn the grill to medium heat for about 15 minutes, or until the oil burns.
3. Keep Bacteria Out of Your Food
You wouldn’t cook on a skillet you hadn’t cleaned, so why would you cook on a grill you hadn’t sanitized? A soiled grill attracts germs and bacteria, which can contaminate your meal and make you unwell. Clean your grills with a wire brush.
4. It Will Take Less Time For Your Grill To Heat Up
Grilling will take a little longer if your grill is caked in food particles, sauces, or stuck-on trash. A clean grill will heat up evenly and cook food more quickly than one that is unclean. A griddle scraper helps you to remove food debris from your griddle and keep it clean.
5. Grease Build-Up Can Lead to Flare-Ups
You have to keep an eye out for flare-ups, which can burn you or start a fire. Failure to keep your grills clean could result in an accumulation of grease, which could lead to a flare-up later.
6. Rust Can Be Avoided
If ingested, rust is not only ugly on a barbecue, but it may also be dangerous to you and your family. Maintaining a clean grill can help prevent rust from forming on the grill grates, warming rack, or burners, lowering the risk of rust entering your food. If you have a grill cover, put it on after every use, because water can cause rust.
What is the best way to clean a grill?
Use Baking soda to clean a BBQ grill
Baking soda (bicarbonate of soda) is a miracle ingredient that dissolves all types of organic things, and it's especially good at getting rid of oil and stuck-on food. Allow it to sit for a few minutes after liberally sprinkling across a moist BBQ grate.
Then, using warm water and a soapy sponge, activate the soda. After rinsing, you should be good to go. You may use baking soda to clean other areas of your house in addition to cleaning your BBQ.
Baking soda, although its effective cleaning properties, will not scratch your BBQ, which is critical for keeping your metal barbecue in good working order. BBQ grill is made of stainless steel since it is durable and does not rust like most other metals; however, when cleaning it, you should avoid using anything too harsh.
Use Vinegar to keep your grill grates clean
Combine half a bottle of white vinegar and warm water in a spray bottle and spray onto your grill. Let it sit for half an hour. Then, pour out the contents of the bottle and replace it with a tiny amount of neat vinegar. Spray your grate once more, let it sit for yet another half hour, and then wipe it clean. Acetic acid, the key element in vinegar, dissolves dirt and food detritus.
However, vinegar may be used in a variety of ways to clean your home. With the addition of a pinch of table salt, your seasonings have been converted into a rust remover. When you open up your Barbecue after the winter, you may see rust on the grill. Simply immerse the BBQ grill in a salt and vinegar solution overnight and clean it.
Clean your Grills with a specialized Grill Brush
All-purpose brushes and sponges aren't the ideal choices for cleaning BBQs because they're unlikely to be tough enough, and you'll have to use a lot of extra force with your hands to obtain a good outcome. An overcast day is preferable for cleaning stainless steel; the hot sun can make it hard to eliminate streaks from stainless-steel surfaces.
A grill brush, on the other hand, has a longer handle with a harsh scourer attached, allowing you to work more efficiently. Make sure you turn off the gas and propane tank before cleaning a gas grill.
Use a pumice stone to clean your grill grates
Did you know that the same product that many people use to scrub their feet can also be used to clean a dirty grill? Pumice stone is naturally antibacterial and good at removing stuck-on food. You can even find ones specifically designed for cleaning charcoal grills.
Pumice stone by HATOKU is an amazing cleaner that helps you deep clean quickly and easily clean grease, stains, residues, and dirt without scratching surfaces. Before cleaning the cooking grates, make sure that you Soak the area to be cleaned and the gray pumice before cleaning so that the pumice has a more powerful cleaning function.
Soak your grill grates in hot soapy water
This strategy is self-evident, but patience is the key to its success. Fill a large plastic tray halfway with hot water and one of the best dishwashing detergents available. Remove all of the grates from the grill once it has cooled and soak them completely in a tub of warm, soapy water. Allow at least 30 minutes for them to soak.
Remove any other items that can be easily removed from the grill, such as burner control knobs, heating racks, and grease pans. The burner tubes on most gas barbecues can also be removed. Next, clean the grill with a dishcloth and hot soapy water.
Oil your grill grates
Cooking grates are made of metal, which rusts if not properly maintained. The grates on your grill may rust or mildew if you keep them outside during the winter or if you don't use it for extended periods of time.
It's a slow process, but once it begins, it can completely wreck your grates and your day. Cooking oil should be applied on a paper towel. Wipe clean and rub the cooking grates with the oil until they're clean.
Using a paper towel, coat it in cooking oil. Rub the oil into the grill grates, wiping and massaging them until they are clean. Clean any rust spots that won't come off with the oil with another paper towel soaked in white distilled vinegar.
Apply a second coat of oil to the grate. To bake the oil into the grates, return them to the grill and heat them to 300°F for 30 minutes to an hour. At the halfway point, inspect the grates and apply extra vegetable oil if necessary. Using a clean, dry paper towel, wipe the grates. Then turn off the heat and apply another thin coat of vegetable oil.
How to clean your Gas Grills?
1. Preheat the gas grill on high for 15 minutes before turning it off.
2. Turn off the gas, either from the propane tank or from the gas line.
3. Using a strong wire grill brush soaked in water, clean the grill. When cleaning the grill, avoid bending over it because this will generate a lot of steam.
4. Add dish soap or a grill cleaner to the water for difficult oil patches.
5. Wipe the cast iron grill grates with a damp cloth to remove any food debris or wire brush bristles when it has cooled. At the same time, you can also scrub your grill grates with aluminum foil to remove any hard particles.
6. Using a dry wire brush, remove the burners from the gas supply route and any blockages in the burner's gas ports. Brush the ports side to side rather than up and down, as vertical motion might push debris into the openings.
7. Clean the inside of the burner opening with hot soapy water and run water through it.
8. Use a wire brush and lukewarm soapy water to clean the inside of the grill, then rinse with water. Reinstall the burners after drying them with a towel.
9. You may store a propane grill outside with the propane tank attached if you have one. Remove the propane tank and store it outside, away from direct sunlight, if stored inside.
How to clean your Charcoal grills?
Clean the grill grates and charcoal grate
Remove the grill grate if possible and clean it together with the charcoal grate. Use a grill brush or another coarse cleaning brush to clean it. On a kettle charcoal BBQ, repeat with the charcoal grate.
Use aluminum foil
A ball of aluminum foil works well as a scrubber. Aluminum foil helps you to keep your BBQ clean and helps to scrub your cooking grates.
Clean the bottom of the grill
Brush or wipe any debris from the grill's bottom. Empty the ash catcher if one exists. After that, scrape off any peeling black gunk with a bristle brush or putty knife (usually carbon flakes and grease). If using a kettle grill, clean the exterior of the lid with soapy water and grill as desired.
Reassemble the grills back
Reassemble all of the grill's components, and you're ready to grill!
These steps will help you keep your grills clean and help you get ready for this grilling season.
