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Aggie MacKenzie’s Top 10 Kitchen Cleaning Tips
We caught up with How Clean is Your House star Aggie MacKenzie to find out how she keeps her kitchen so spotless. Here are her top 10 tips.
Aggie's fearsome reputation for taking other people to task for their household grime is on the line for the special celebrity series of Come Dine With Me. Her guests, TV host Anneka Rice, Birds of a Feather actress Linda Robson, comedian Roland Riveron, and food critic and author Toby Young, are as interested in probing her own home for signs of dirt as they are tasting her food. Hopefully, she takes her own advice...
If your roasting pan is covered in burnt-on food, sprinkle on some biological washing powder, add some boiling water and simmer on the hob for 10 minutes. All that mess will come off really easily.
Stainless steel-fronted appliances are very fashionable, but they do tend to get covered in greasy marks. The best way of getting them off is to use microfibre cloths. They’re widely available in shops such as John Lewis.
Make sure you never let cats and other animals walk around on your kitchen work surfaces. Their feet can tread bacteria around that could be harmful.
If you have a vinyl floor, you’ll know that it can collect a lot of black scuffmarks. They might seem stubborn if you try to scrub at them, but they’re actually simple to remove if you use a plain old pencil eraser.
If you’ve overheated and exploded a curry in your microwave and the inside now looks like it’s had a case of diarrhoea, you can remove the mess with ease by microwaving a shallow dish filled with slices of lemon and hot water for five minutes. The steam will soften the dried food and the lemon will leave it smelling fresh.
In warm, humid weather, bacteria can really multiply in your dishcloth. To help keep it clean, you can simply stick it in your dishwasher (if you have one) at the end of the day with the rest of the load, or just leave it in the sink overnight with a little washing up liquid and bleach. Quick and easy.
Drains do tend to get smelly, especially in warm weather. Fortunately, it’s not so hard to get them smelling sweet again. By pouring down some washing soda crystals and boiling water you should be able to clear the offending blockages of grease and grime.
To remove limescale from your kettle, pour in a mixture of half vinegar and half water, boil it up and leave overnight. In the morning, all that limescale should just fall away.
Frying fish can leave a fishy smell for a long time. To get your kitchen smelling fresh again, simply simmer some orange peel, cloves and water for 10 minutes.
A lot of people do it, but you should never wash chicken. All those splashes could be laden with harmful salmonella bacteria, spreading it around the kitchen without you realising.
You can also read an interview with Aggie in the August issue of 4homes magazine, which is on sale now.
