5 Oven Maintenance Tips for the Summer
Oven maintenance is one of those jobs householders just love to hate. With the summer sun finally deciding to show its face it can mean there is a lot going on in your kitchen. The kids have their friends over, the BBQ food needs preparing and the ladies want somewhere to have a good old natter. You wouldn’t be wrong in thinking this could be the worst time for your oven to take a holiday and breakdown. It is not exactly what you need!
5 Oven Maintenance Tips for the Summer
The sausages are not cooking, the roast dinners are not roasting and the oven is not doing its job. To help you keep that oven alive for as long as possible, here are 5 oven maintenance tips, essential advice for any household that does a lot of cooking, hosting and food preparation over the long summer months. Oven maintenance is never fun but is an essential part of good housekeeping and ensuring the kitchen runs smoothly.
Clean the Oven Regularly
This may sound straight forward but every oven works at its best when it is well cleaned. If the oven is full of grease, oil and everything else it will not work as well, it will take much longer to heat and not look like the most appealing place to cook your food either.
Clean your oven regularly, once every two weeks, with a little baking soda and some water. Make sure to avoid the heating elements unless they are covered in dirt. With a little elbow grease and some hard work, it won’t be long until your oven is looking as new as the day you bought it.
If you get stuck at any point there are lots of additional tips on oven cleaning available online. Alternatively if you do not fancy getting your hands dirty then there are many specialist oven cleaning firms that would be delighted to action a home visit just to clean your dirty oven.
Use a Drip Tray With the Oven
We aren’t all like Jamie Oliver who seems to be the messiest chef in the world but have the most immaculate kitchen. Instead, when you are cooking anything that might drip, splatter or leak in the oven, use a drip tray. All you need is to insert a tray with some tin foil on underneath whatever you are cooking. This will catch most of the dirt making the oven easier to clean next time.
A drip tray reduces the amount of cooking dirt, grease and food residue that builds up over time. It is a great way to stop an oven getting dirty too fast.
Cook Food on a Lower Temperature
Whether your oven is a fan oven, has eating elements or is just a hole with a fire in it in the middle of your kitchen, using it on a lower heat for a little longer can mean it keeps work much better. Instead of using an extremely high heat for a short period of time, turning the temperature down and cooking your meals for longer can mean your oven lasts longer too.
The heating elements or fan in the oven will struggle to cope with the demand of having to heat up to such an extremely high temperature and then cool down again.
Check the Seals on the Oven Doors
If you notice that your oven seems to be heating the whole room rather than the food then it may be time to replace your ovens seals (the parts used to keep the heat within the oven). Plugging this unnecessary heat loss means replacing the seals in the door.
When you have done this you can find your oven cooks your food more effectively because all the heat is being used to heat your food rather than to escape through the door into the kitchen.
If All Else Fails
If all else fails and you find your oven is unbearably dirty, isn’t working as well as it should be, losing heat all over the place, then it may be time to get yourself a brand new oven. These oven maintenance tips can only take you so far. If this is the case then you need to know you are getting the best product and the best people to fit it for you.
Contact Kitchen Finesse, one of the UK’s leading fitted Kitchen Companies and find the perfect oven for your kitchen. With a new oven installed the kitchen will hum back to life with the smell of rich foods cooking and a bright shiny new oven to serve the household for many years and dinners to come.
