how to clean your microwave....for real.

There is a battle waging in my house. One between good and evil..... err.....ok, maybe just clean and dirty, but it might as well be good and evil!

A few years ago, I requested one of these from my mom for Christmas.

Boom! You don't wanna see what's going on under here...

I thought it would help keep the microwave clean(ish -- I'm not completely unrealistic). In theory, you cover your food, so when you hit 3 minutes instead of 30 seconds and your burrito explodes, the bean carnage will be contained. The flaw in this contraption is this:

IT ONLY WORKS WHEN YOU KEEP IT IN THE MICROWAVE!

For whatever reason, Jack HATES my burrito-carnage-container. I must put it back in the microwave 10 times a day (because, well, it doesn't work if it's not actually inside the microwave -- duh). Every time he heats up anything, I find it on the stove. Infuriating. Which is why, cleaning the microwave has always been his responsibility.... until now!

I recently found (on Pinterest) about 35 different posts on cleaning your microwave. My favorite is from the Complete Guide to Imperfect Homemaking that includes 7 other wonderful household uses for vinegar (who knew!?!).

It's so easy.

Take 2/3 cup water & 2/3 cup vinegar (white) and combine in a glass MICROWAVE SAFE bowl. Now turn your microwave on for about 10 minutes (no burrito carnage container, just the bowl). 10 minutes seemed like an insanely long time to have my microwave running. I was fairly certain it would explode, but it didn't. Whew. Now remove the bowl (with oven mits, or a towel or something because it's HOTHOT), and wipe out the inside of your microwave with a sponge. You've essentially just steam cleaned your microwave! BAM!

Now THAT'S a clean microwave!!

Don't get me wrong, I had to do it twice to get our microwave sparkling clean -- but I fully attribute that to the state of our microwave, and how long it's been since anyone had cleaned it (ahem). I'll bet if you do this regularly every few weeks (err... months?), it'll stay pretty consistently clean. We shall see... but for now, score one point for team good.