Home Run Stainless Steel Appliance Cleaner

Posted on 19. Jul, 2010 by catherine in Blog, Healthy Home

Here I present Exhibit A, my smudgy dishwasher.

The culprits? Three kids, including a grabby toddler. Also to blame: dirty feet kicking the dishwasher shut (don’t ask).

Maybe you have used an ammonia-based window spray on your stainless appliances. It was my go-to solution but it somehow never looked very nice. Clean, but streaky.

See?

While I was searching online for a stainless steel appliance cleaner to purchase, I found a $15 aerosol spray from a major chemical corporation (Maybe Many Might know who they are? You get a gold star if you figure out my nebulous reference). It sounded a little steep to me, so I was off to search for a good homemade cleaner.

I found one! I call this a “Home Run” cleaner since I love it for four reasons.

1. It’s inexpensive

2. It’s just as effective or more effective than the product it replaces

3. It’s simple to make

4. It’s much safer for the environment than its market counterpart

Keep in mind, however, it still has a mild toxicity, so please keep it away from small children and animals. Since it also contains alcohol, it’s a wee bit flammable, so be careful with that as well.

The recipe for this wonderful stainless steel appliance cleaner is so simple yet incredibly effective. Here goes:

Home Run Stainless Steel Appliance Cleaner

one part rubbing (isopropyl) alcohol
one part mineral oil (or baby oil)

Mix together in a small container. I like to use mineral oil since it has no strong fragrances, but feel free to use baby oil. You can find mineral oil near where you would find rubbing alcohol, in the first aid section of most stores. You can choose the amounts depending on the size of container you use.

Make sure to give it a good shake every time you use it.

To make it all fancy-like, I put it in a cute little 2 oz. travel container. Don’t forget to label it!

That’s it.

Phew. Now I’m done.

Okay, okay, I know I still need to show you how to do it. There is a method here. You have to use a microfiber cloth to make this work correctly.

Procedure

Step 1: pour a small amount of cleaner onto a microfiber cloth and rub around using a circular pattern. There will be streaks left behind, but no worries.