Has anyone tried this in a self-cleaning oven?

[joeekaitis]

I can't remember where I read it, but supposedly spraying water on the walls of a self-cleaning oven before starting the cycle will create a short period of steam that loosens the dirt and makes the cycle more effective.

Is it one of those "can't hurt, might help" things or is there any merit to it?

 

[mrcleanjeans]

the sizzle will fizzle

IMHO,whoever came up with this idea was blowing steam.

 

[retromom]

It can't hurt.....

Hey Joe:

I will try this in the WP. What's the worst that can happen....wet oven grime? Unless the "short period" of steam actually means "short" as in electrical. Bzzzzzzt! :-0

Venus

 

[maytagbear]

When I had a self-cleaning oven,

I just cleaned it fairly often, at least every two months. One period when I was enthralled by Barbara Kafka's very good book, Roasting, I cleaned it every week.

Still cheaper to run a cleaning cycle than to buy Easy-Off! (and a lot safer).

However, that was an apartment ago, and this current oven isn't self cleaning. Non-self cleaning electric ovens are not much fun to clean. At all.

I've toyed with the idea of getting a second hand self cleaner, but I'd want to be totally sure the cycle still worked.

My dream vintage electric is a Frigidaire from the late 60s to mid 70s, possibly in Poppy, but decidedly with the Speed Heat element and the Heat Minder element. As I have said elsewhere here, the best cooks I have known on electrics, insisted on Frigidaires.

(Maybe it is the big coils of the elements?)

Lawrence/Maytagbear

 

[frigilux]

Caveat: Following the directions in a bread-baking book, I sprayed some water into my preheated oven (a self-cleaning Maytag) to create steam for baking. To my horror, it caused a thousand little hairline cracks in the glass-like coating of the oven's interior. The self-cleaning cycle never worked quite as well after that.

I suppose if you spray the water into the oven before you heat it, there isn't as much of a temperature shock; but I'll never spray water into a self-cleaning oven again!

 

[foraloysius]

For non self cleaning ovens somebody advised me to put a small bowl with some ammonia in the oven a few hours before you clean it. It seems that the ammonia softens the dirt and makes it much easier to clean an oven that is not self cleaning. Note: I haven't tried it myself yet.

 

[fixerman]

The bowl of amonia in a non self cleaning oven does work for light cleaning. It doesn't work very well on heavy baked on crud.