I cleaned and painted the BBQ this weekend and replaced the burner. (Burners seem to last me about three years.)
I scrubbed the grate, but it still looked rough, so I threw it in the oven and ran the self-cleaning cycle. It came out looking terrific.
Couple things:
- Do a basic cleaning first. During the self-cleaning cycle my freshly-scrubbed grate smoked enough to set off the fire alarm. It was no big deal – I just needed to open a few windows and turn on the exhaust vent – but a really muck-encrusted grate might catch fire.
- Line the bottom of the oven with aluminum foil to catch all of the debris. When I removed the grate there was a shower of ash and rust flakes.
- After the self-clean I scrubbed the grate outside with the wire brush I always use to clean it. That got rid of the leftover ash and loose rust.
P.S. This also works for cast iron cookware, steel baking sheets, and pretty much anything else made of iron or steel. I haven’t tried it with aluminum and I wouldn’t try it with any kind of non-stick coating like Teflon.
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“Self-cleaning cycle?”
LUXURY!
I use foaming grill/oven cleaner and after that soaks for a bit I hit it with my pressure washer. Works great. I’ve also found that if I clean the grate after each grilling session, while it is still good and hot, it is easiest. I splash liberal amounts of water on the hot grate and scrub it with a brush. The water/steam seems to shock the gunk off of it.
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One tip:
DO NOT do this with porcelain coated grates. I ruined a nice set of porcelain coated cast iron grates for my Weber gasser.
They came out of the oven looking great, but they started to corrode quickly; by a month later the porcelain was flaking off and the cast iron was rusty.
–
Also, my wife put our aluminum AirBake cookie sheets in the oven cleaning cycle (electric oven) and they came out looking brand new. But it changed the temper of the metal, and it’s much more flexible now than it was.
Nonstick I haven’t tried, but since the best way to kill nonstick is to overheat it…
Cleaning your grates?
What???
The “gunk” adds flavor.
Very cool, thanks for the tip!
Definately don’t put your non-stick in the oven on self-clean. The non-stick coating breaks down at a much lower temp than the oven gets on self-clean and might actually emit a poisonous gas depending on which kind it is.
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