About this Recipe

Is your microwave looking and smelling a bit unpleasant lately? It could be due for a good cleaning. Stains stuck on food and nasty odours; they are all something we deal with if we use a microwave constantly. Our microwaves make our lives so much easier, so why not make cleaning it easier with some great cleaning tips? Since you use your microwave for cooking food, it's very important that you not use chemicals to clean it. If you do, they could off-gas and absorb into the foods you're heating or cooking in your microwave, which wouldn't be good for your health.

The good news is that you can easily clean your microwave using natural house cleaners like vinegar, lemon and water. These natural house cleaners are perfect for cleaning pretty much anything in your kitchen as well as in your bathroom. Vinegar and lemon have antibacterial and deodorizing properties, which makes them both perfect for cleaning tough stains and tackling bad odours in a microwave.

They also work to loosen the stuck on food inside of your microwave, making it easier for you to wipe it clean in no time at all. The nice thing is, you can use vinegar or lemon juice for this cleaning tip depending on what you have on hand in your kitchen. You can use white vinegar, apple cider vinegar, lemon juice or lemon essential oil diluted in water.

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You will use these natural house cleaners in some water and then you'll let the microwave do all of the cleaning work for you. How is this possible? Well, you put the two ingredients into the water in a microwavable bowl or cup, and then you allow it to heat up with the microwave on and it will create steam. This steam will be perfect for loosening up all of the stuck on food and grease in the microwave, plus it will neutralize any odours that may linger.

Just slice up two lemons and juice them to add to a cup of water if you're using vinegar use half vinegar and half water. If you're using lemon essential oil, use a cup of water with 4 to 6 drops of essential oil in it. Put the bowl or cup with the natural house cleaners in the microwave as you would any other food or drink and then set your microwave for one minute at a time or longer if you feel comfortable with that. Each microwave is different, so just use your best judgement for your own machine as far as timing. You can also place a wooden spoon in the cup or bowl since this will help to disperse the heat, so there aren't any major zaps from the heat. Once you see some steam building up, this is when you can stop the microwave, but don't open the door. This is very important since you don't want to let any of the steam out of the microwave since this is what will help loosen all of that gunk.

Let it sit with the steam in it for 10 minutes to work its magic and once the time is up, open the door and use a kitchen sponge to wipe down the entire inside of the microwave. You can also use some natural cleaning spray to clean it even more and to really get out the odour, and the stuck on food. You can also try using the lemon essential oil in a spray bottle mixed with some water to spray all over the inside of your microwave, then place a clean sponge that's fully saturated in water in the microwave and nuke that for 1 or 2 minutes. Again, allow the steam to permeate in the microwave and then open up to wipe clean.