One of the first things everybody with the luxury of owning a microwave should do is develop a mental list of what should and should not go in the microwave. Doing so will save you many, many more incidents in the future that will require cleaning. However, may it be a temporary slip of memory or just several runs in the microwave, the day will come where it will have an odor or stain that seems to not go away. Read on for the best ways to prevent this from affecting your meals and quality of life in the kitchen.
Assess the microwave after every run
It doesn’t matter what you put in. May it be your Grandma’s special spaghetti being reheated for the fiftieth time, or a quick zap of toast: inspect the microwave after every time you take something out. Stray crumbs or splashes of food will stick to your kitchen appliance and never leave. If you start to notice a lot of smells and stains after a particular item being put in the microwave, see if there are any alternatives for what you can use to keep your meal warm and ready to eat!
Clean-Up
So it happened: there’s a strange taste in your meals that faintly tastes like the popcorn you burned last week. What do you do to fix it? To thoroughly clean the inside of your microwave and keep that taste out of your food, use the following ‘steaming solution’. The best part? You only need a couple ingredients: gather one cup of water into a bowl that will be able to survive its run in the microwave, add three slices of the citrus fruit of your choice, one table of vinegar or essential oils you may have laying around, and, for good measure, a tablespoon of baking soda. Microwave this all together for five minutes on high. Allow the microwave to take in the steam for a couple minutes (around four or five) to access any grime that may be sitting in your well-loved microwave.
If the smell still lingers after this process, give special attention to the turntable (this is the large piece in the center that spins to make sure your food is heated evenly, and is removable in most microwaves). Instead of simply just scrubbing the top, take the piece out and give it a rinse in the sink with soap and water. If you remove the turntable and there’s a significant amount of gunk underneath, immediately start working on washing this with something that’ll efficiently scrub it all away. This can range from an unused toothbrush to a sponge you may have laying around. Scrub the interior with an odor absorbing substance (think Fresh Wave or other cleaning supplies you’d use around the house), and assess where the smell is coming from. If you note stubborn stains, scrub this area with your citrus solution and an abrasive surface that won’t damage the microwave itself.
Of course, this process won’t be quick if the odor still remains. Keep the door open for several days with no cooking usage to allow any excess scents leave the kitchen (I recommend keeping the windows in your house open so the rest of your living quarters doesn’t smell, too) and give it a chance to reset. This should work so you can get back to using your convenient kitchen appliance again without having to sacrifice the quality that will be impeded by Stinky Microwave Syndrome.
