The Best Way To Clean All That Burnt Sugar Off Your Pans

When a recipe calls for caramelized sugar, you're likely to have some concerns about your cookware. While caramelized sugar tastes amazing, it can leave pots and pans looking quite messy. And, when attempting to remove hardened sugar from your pans, you might cause irrevocable damage to your cherished cookware. Fortunately, there's a proven method you can use to efficiently remove burnt sugar without incurring major damage. This technique involves adding water to the pot or pan and boiling it.

Ultra-hot water is ideal for decreasing the toughness of burnt sugar, making it easier to remove from the surface of the pan. Once the water is boiling, turn the heat to the lowest setting and allow the pan to sit on the stovetop for up to ten minutes. You can also use a plastic or wooden utensil to further break up the caramelized sugar as the water boils. In the event that the burnt sugar is particularly tough, repeat the process as much as you need to until the cookware is sparkling clean.

While baking soda and white vinegar have many culinary uses, they're also highly effective cleaning agents. This is especially true when it comes to tough stains on your cookware, as these two kitchen staples are capable of breaking down even the stickiest of residues. You can pour straight white vinegar into your pan, or mix it with water, and boil the liquid on your stovetop. Once the solution is simmering inside, turn off the heat and relocate the pan to your sink.

Next, sprinkle about one cup of baking soda over the white vinegar inside the pan. The baking soda and white vinegar will create a chemical reaction that efficiently loosens the hardened sugar from the surface of the material. Allow some time for this process to take place to make your cleaning efforts easier. After some time has elapsed, pour out the remaining white vinegar and baking soda solution and start scrubbing. In the event the caramelized sugar still won't break free, you can add more baking soda as you scrub.

There's also a surprising one-ingredient cleaning method you can use to eliminate pesky sugar residue from cookware. While it takes a bit of time, ketchup is quite effective at the task, thanks to a key ingredient: acetic acid. Also present in vinegar, acetic acid is great for breaking down bits of stuck-on food, including hardened sugar. While the actual amount of acetic acid can vary, most ketchup brands consist of about 5% acetic acid. That makes the popular condiment effective for cleaning, but mild enough to keep cookware intact.

In addition to being highly effective, using ketchup to clean sugar-crusted pots and pans is simple enough. Cover the hardened sugar with a nice layer of ketchup, then allow the cookware to rest overnight. The following morning, you should find that burnt sugar is far easier to remove, since the acetic acid will have loosened the caramelized sugar. Now you can caramelize sugar to your heart's content knowing that you have plenty of tools in your cleaning arsenal.