11/01/2025
Well here it is again. We're going into the holiday cooking season, so I'm posting my annual tips:
1. Never use the self-clean feature on an oven especially before Thanksgiving.
Self-clean gets the oven to a thousand degrees or more and turns all the debris to dust. Unfortunately, modern ovens have a hard time taking this much heat and it usually causes problems. So if you want a nice clean oven before Thanksgiving do it the old fashioned way. Or if you're oven has a steam clean feature, that's the better choice. In my opinion, don't clean your oven until after the holiday season.
2. Don't put open containers of liquid or hot food into the refrigerator. All should be covered or closed before putting in the refrigerator. The refrigerator is a big dehumidifier and it sucks out the moisture from liquids, fruits, vegetables and leftovers. It's always better to have everything covered. And open and close the doors as quickly as possible. Especially with citrus fruits. Citrus fruits are very acidic. And when you put them in your refrigerator it sucks out those acids and deposits them on the aluminum evaporators. This is not good for your cooling system. In time it starts to break down the metals. You should always cover any fruits that are high in acids. Cover all your leftovers. Do your homework on how to properly store leafy vegetables to skin vegetables etc.
This also goes for opened drinks like teas Kool-Aids soda pops anything that has sugary contents. Keep everything covered and it'll make your refrigerator last longer and smell better.
3. 99.99999% of everything needs to go into trash and NOT down the garbage disposal. Think of your home plumbing as arteries in your body. The more things coagulate, the more constricted the artery gets, and then your home has a heart attack.
4. 99.99999% of food needs to be scraped into the trash BEFORE placing dishes into the dishwasher. Most modern dishwashers have filters, not choppers. You want to keep your dishwasher sanitary and in normal working condition, so prevent solid foods from going into the dishwasher. It's an old wives tale that your dishes need to be a little dirty so your dishwasher knows how much to clean. Trust me the OWL sensor in your dishwasher will be just fine without dirty dishes.
5. Prevent from running your microwave for excessive amounts of time. Most microwaves can handle it, some not so much. I would say about 7 to 10 minutes of continuous run time is about the max I would recommend running the microwave, then let it cool down before running it again. Clean the inside of the microwave especially on the right hand side where the cardboard looking piece is. (waveguide cover) when that gets dirty it will sometimes allow the microwaves to bounce around incorrectly and cause damage to your magnetron antenna. When cleaning it just use a lightly damned water only cloth and let it dry before using the microwave.
6. Safe temperature settings for your refrigerator should be 0° for the freezer and 35-36° for the refrigerator. Basically we want the refrigerator as cold as it'll get without freezing food. Above 40° bacteria starts to grow really quick and nobody wants food poisoning. Reheat all leftovers thoroughly. And my final saying, "when in doubt throw it out!"
I hope everybody has a happy amazing successful holiday cooking season. But if you have any questions, please text me at 918-280-9509.
And if you did not heed my warning and used self-clean on your oven Wednesday. I am not working on Thanksgiving. Cheers everyone!
