6 Helpful Kitchen Hood Cleaning Tips To Try in 2024
Keeping everything in your kitchen spotlessly clean can be a daunting task, yet it’s an unavoidable necessity. Unfortunately, many people forget about kitchen hood maintenance for too long, which leaves them with a smelly mess that can be quite difficult to get rid of.
That’s why we recommend starting a cleaning routine as soon as possible! Here’s a couple of tips to get things started!
1. Get it scheduled!
In most cases, you don’t really need to clean your range hood that often. However, if you’re deep frying and doing some heavy cooking daily, you might want to consider cleaning it more frequently. It all depends on your specific kitchen habits, so make sure to clean accordingly to your own needs. You’ll notice when your hood needs cleaning by noticing a foul smell coming from the vents. Our advice is to get it all cleaned before any signs of accumulated grease, dust, and bacteria (that produce the smell in the first place) appear. Basically, keep a cleaning schedule and designate certain days on your monthly calendar for deep-cleaning your hood and its vents and filters.
As soon as it becomes a set routine, it will become much easier to handle! If you just keep doing it randomly, you’re more likely to forget about it and create some unnecessary problems for yourself.
2. Use HOT water!
As you’ll be dealing with greasy surfaces, cold or lukewarm water simply won’t be able to do the trick. When it comes to grease, there’s only one rule: the hotter the better! Get it boiled if you have to, just keep it as hot as you can for the best possible results!
Once you have your boiling water, we recommend getting some dish soap and baking soda. Your filters should be soaked in this hot solution for about half an hour if you want it to be effective. Only after the excess grease is removed, you can start scrubbing your filters clean!
Overall, if you try to use lukewarm water, you won’t be able to get far. Your filters won’t be free of all the accumulated grease and all of your efforts will be for nothing. No matter how strong the dish soap you’re using is, without the help of boiling water you won’t be able to remove the grease. So don’t believe the suppliers when they tell you their cleaning products remove grease by having some mysterious magical properties!
3. Get high-quality cleaning products
The dish soap you’ll be using has to be of good quality if you want to succeed in cleaning the hood properly. You can also find some specialized anti-grease products that can help you clean everything thoroughly. However, DIY-ing your own cleaning solution with some dish soap and a bit of baking soda is completely viable. You don’t have to buy overpriced cleaning products just to get your hood functional again. Still, don’t go for the cheapest product around as these can do you more harm than good.
If you’re not sure what brand of products to use we recommend reading up on some online reviews before making your choice. Also, you can always ask an industry professional for some advice to maximize your cleaning results.
4. Simply hire a professional company
While kitchen hood maintenance and care aren’t the most complicated things in the world, those activities could take up a lot of your time and energy if you want to do it efficiently. That’s why many people simply leave it to the hands of professionals.
Range hood cleaning services such as the Atlanta-based www.hoodcleaningservicesatlanta.com can help you achieve the best results as quickly as possible. In this way, you won’t be forced to sacrifice your precious time and energy on such a mundane task, which is a huge plus.
Other than that though, professional cleaners can give you some valuable advice for keeping your hood healthy. They’ll be able to help you with creating and managing your cleaning schedule in no time!
Make sure to do your research to find a high-quality cleaning service in your local area. Look at their online ratings and customer testimonials to get a better picture. Even better, get a recommendation from your friends or colleagues if they’re using a similar service.
5. Never forget about the vent
The vent that connects your hood to the outside can sometimes get clogged with grease. When that happens, your hood may lose its functionality, so be careful to check it while you’re cleaning your filters.
If there’s grease built up in the vent, you may want to contact a professional. Cleaning it by yourself is usually not the best way to go about it, since you’re probably lacking in expertise and proper equipment.
Whatever the case, if you notice there’s tons of grease accumulated in your vent, clean it as soon as possible, as it can present a serious fire hazard. A professional cleaner will be able to help you prevent such issues from happening in the future, so consider hiring one.
6. Clean the outside too
Lastly, you should always keep the exterior as clean as possible. The splatter from cooking particles can make a huge mess and potentially ruin how your hood looks. In the long run, it can also be potentially damaging to the hood materials as well, so make sure to clean at least once a week.
Wiping it with a wet cloth and a bit of a dish detergent should be enough to finish the job. It will also only take you a couple of minutes to get it done, so there’s no real reason to skip this task!
The bottom line
Cleaning your kitchen hood from time to time is of the utmost importance. The frequency on which you should do it mostly depends on your cooking habits. Make sure to clean it once a month, at least. Clean your filters with some hot water and a bar of high-quality dish soap, and remember to always check your vents for built-up grease. Consider hiring a professional service if you want to get the best possible results.
