Sunday, March 21, 2010

A Stain Removal Song for this Sunday Morning (Remove Tea and Coffee Stains)

I love coffee,
He loves tea,
We love hot bevvies,
But the stains bother MEEEE....

Yes, I actually did sing that as I typed it. :) How sad. Feel free to roll your eyes.

Right, so if you're a tea or coffee drinker then you're also well aware that the beverages taste delicious, but the stains they leave behind in our favorite mugs and cups are far less charming. I've found three things that help remove those nasty stains:
  1. Baking soda - the old favorite is a star again. Scrub with baking soda and a scrubby pad.
  2. Table salt - same thing, but a little grittier for even more difficult stains.
  3. Barkeepers Friend - The hardest, oldest stains are no match for this cleaner. When I was writing my book, I researched this marvelous powdered cleanser and discovered that it's derived from rhubarb. Hmmm. And here I always thought rhubarb was just good in pie. Wrongo, it's also good for scrubbing stains away (and cleaning your stainless, copper, etc...but I'll try to remain on topic here.)

Plus, a little scrubby pad called 'The World's Greatest Scrubbie' is available in many kitchenware shops. At the store where I work part-time we sell them for around $2.99. I always use that when scrubbing away stubborn beverage stains -- so keep an eye out for them in your locale. They're little rectangles of rainbow colored cleaning extraordinariness. (IF that's even a word.)

Right, now, go grab a coffee or tea and don't worry for even a single moment about any stains to come. :) Have a lovely Sunday while you're at it.

1 comment:

Unknown said...

Forget all that scrubbing! I just set my cups in the sink and spray the inside with that cheap all purpose bleach cleaner that you can buy in the Dollar Stores. Leave them sitting there for a few minutes and all the stains are gone. Just pop them in the dish water and wash them.

Also,I always spray the cleaner into my dish water to keep it from souring if I go away and leave it for a while.