Like anything else, a coffee maker works at its best when it is clean. Coffee addicts would agree that when it is clean, a coffee maker can make a perfect brew that captures the aroma and taste of the beans. There are a lot of cleaning solutions out in the market, but you really don’t need to buy those. You have things at home that you can use to clean your coffee maker and here are a few of them:
Vinegar
Vinegar is a powerful acid and therefore makes a good cleaner. If you live in hardwater areas, you may need to clean your coffee maker very often because minerals coming from the water can clog in your machine. This will cause a delay in the brewing time, as well as a weird taste in the finished product. When that happens, it means it’s time for a good cleaning. Here’s how you can use vinegar to clean your coffee maker:
1. Fill the water reservoir with 4 cups of vinegar, and 4 cups of water.
2. Remove filter and coffee from the filter basket. Put in a new filter.
3. Run the coffee maker as if you are brewing it for breakfast, then turn it off and let it sit for about 10 minutes. Warning: remind yourself and your housemates that you are cleaning the coffee maker, most importantly when doing this in the morning. A lot of people walk to the coffee maker in the morning with eyes half closed.
4. Repeat steps 1 and 3 (and skip the warning)
5. After another 10 minutes, fill the reservoir with clean water to flush out the vinegar and water mixture.
6. Repeat the rinse cycle until you can no longer smell the vinegar. You can taste at your own risk.
7. Clean the outside of the machine with a damp cloth and a little bit of soap or dishwashing liquid.
Alka-Seltzer
Okay. Everyone knows Alka-Seltzer is what we drink to neutralize excess gastric juices and relieve tummyaches caused by it. When you are cruising the Caribbean, you can toss an Alka-Seltzer tablet in midair and wait for an albatross to catch it. A few seconds later, you will hear a popping sound. That’s the albatross that caught the tablet (I bet you didn’t know that). Because Alka-Seltzer can cure hyperacidity and pop albatross, it makes a good coffee maker cleaner because its components help loosen up the mineral deposits in the reservoir. This can be done by following the clean up steps above, only this time, you will use 4 Alka-Seltzer tablets instead of vinegar. This is just done once (4 tablets is more powerful than vinegar), and the rinsing twice.
Dishwashing Liquid
Dishwashing liquid is used to clean the external parts of your coffee maker. On top of that, it is good in cleaning the insides too because it can take off the oils coming from the coffee bean. To use dishwashing liquid, follow the steps above replacing vinegar (or alka-seltzer) with 2 drops of dishwashing liquid. If you can still see bubbles after rinsing, repeat the process using clean water. Hint: you know you did not do a good job if your coffee looks like it came from the bathtub.
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