Friday, January 3, 2020

Cleaning Burnt Sugar etc. from a Pot: What Actually Works

Back in early November, I was making a tangy mustard sauce for pork and completely forgot about it.  I went into another room while the sugar, mustard powder, egg, and vinegar boiled away for about half an hour, until all that was left was what looked like a ruined pot.  We tried everything to get the pot clean, turning to Google for all the answers.

Boiled water, soapy water, baking soda, vinegar, peroxide, scrubbing with a metal scouring pad, and every combination of those, plus a few more tricks I am probably forgetting, and nothing worked.  We thought we'd have to throw the pot away for sure. 

So, then it got to be December, and I was frustrated with the darn pot.  I put some water in it, put a lid on it, and let it sit, figuring I'd worry about it after Christmas, and if I couldn't find a solution, then we'd shop for a new pot in January. 

Well, as luck would have it, the plain old water, sitting for weeks, was exactly the trick!  Nothing fancy - no boiling needed - no scrubbing - just good old water, and patience.

After eventually taking the lid off of the pot, we saw this floating in there:


It lifted right out, and the bottom of the pot was as good as new. 

Water is magic!


Have you ever had to replace a pot or pan because you burned something so badly?

1 comment:

Lisa from Lisa's Yarns said...

Wow, I never would have guessed that would work! I could have used this trick last week! I made rice to go with a stirfry I made when my sister and BIL stayed with us. I was multi-tasking too much so when I put the cover on the rice after it came to a boil, I forgot to turn the burner down to simmer. Ugh! So it burned so badly! Luckily we were able to salvage enough rice so we could all have rice with our stirfry. But I was so mad at myself. Unfortunately we only have one sauce pan (probably should get another!) so letting it sick for a couple of weeks would have been tough but probably better than all the scrubbing I did!!