The Best Way To Clean Pyrex Dishes And Get Rid Of Those Tough Stains

There are all sorts of kitchen appliances that can deliver great meals, but few are as versatile as a Pyrex dish. Made with heat-resistant glass so you can put it in the oven, it can be used to cook ... well, pretty much anything. The sky's the limit with these dishes.

But the downside to a Pyrex is that it's definitely going to get some crud caked on it during the cooking process. Maybe not every time, but most meals are going to leave at least a bit of stubborn residue. So how do you clean these trusty dishes? Do you have to get in there with an abrasive sponge and scrub it like your life depends on it?

The answer is no. There's a much simpler way to get all up in that Pyrex and get it clean without wearing yourself out, and it relies on a kitchen cleaner's best friend: baking soda.

The first step is to sprinkle some baking soda on top of the stains, followed by dish soap and hot water. The reason baking soda is your go-to here is because it's surprisingly versatile as a cleaning tool, and it's a great natural option that doesn't run the risk of introducing anything toxic to your cooking surfaces. It can be used to get at range hoods, stainless steel, or brass pans, not to mention deep fryers and Tupperware. It's also the go-to for dealing with stubborn grill grates, where it generally works better than any expensive caustic cleaner you can buy.

Baking soda tends to work best in concert with other substances, often dish soap, but just as often vinegar. In this case, though, you're only using the soap; no elementary school volcanoes necessary. While the baking soda, as a mild alkaline, breaks down dirt and grease, the dish soap acts as a surfactant, lifting that dirt and grease from the surface.

Here's the deal with baking soda: It needs time to do its thing. So wait and give the whole process 15 minutes to work. A quarter of an hour in this context may feel like an eternity, but consider yourself lucky; for cleaning something like a carpet, you need to leave it on a lot longer than that (at least three hours!).

The good news is, the mixture isn't going to cause problems if it gets left on for too long. If you forget about the soaking dish and come back two hours later, don't worry; you won't have done any damage to it. The abrasive yet gentle nature of baking soda is what makes it work so well, and that safety net comes into play if you leave it for longer than you need to.

The last step is the only one that might feel like it involves some effort: Scrub with a sponge before rinsing everything off. It's still going to require a little elbow grease — this is Pyrex, after all — but thanks to the baking soda trick, there's no reason you should be covered in sweat by the end of it.

Generally, you should only need to use a soft sponge for this — the baking soda mixture should've freed up the stubborn gunk stuck on there — but it's okay to use something more abrasive. Pyrex dishes are specifically designed to be scratch-resistant, so if you need to get at it with steel wool, you shouldn't have to worry about doing damage to your prized cooking vessel. If stuff is really baked on, add more baking soda while you do this.

Magic Erasers are more helpful in this situation than you might think. They're typically used to get stubborn stains and marks out of porcelain, but you can use them for lots of materials, and they can work surprisingly well for Pyrex. Just let the dish soak in hot water for 15 minutes, then scrub it like your life depends on it.

A dryer sheet is another successful method that can also be used to clean broiler pans; there's something about the conditioning ingredients that help break up baked-in food build-up. It's even simpler than the other methods; just fill the dish with hot water, drop in the sheet, and let it soak for 15 minutes. A soft sponge should take care of the rest; just be sure to wash with soap and water afterward to get any residue from the dryer sheet off the dish (because nobody wants to eat that).

Whichever method you use, it's important to keep your dish clean. It can be a bit of a pain, but a sparkling Pyrex will serve you well by producing delicious food for years.