Hard brushing is suitable with metal and stainless steel strainers with heavy stains. Wear gloves on your hands and place your strainer over a flame to heat for up to 5 minutes. Extinguish the flame and scrub off the stains with a toothbrush. Lastly, rinse off the dirt and let the strainer dry.

Note: The method is not suitable for plastic strainers.

Related Topics:

Tea strainers have small meshed bowls that need to be cleaned after use. Most of them get easily stained after continued use. Check out on chow to lean your strainer.

Vinegar works best in getting rid of the hard stains on your strainers, but sadly, the strainer may absorb the vinegar. Do not be surprised if your tea has some vinegar taste on it. This, however, happens if the strainer is not properly rinsed.

So, to begin the cleaning process, have some gloves and pour some vinegar in a bowl or a basin. Then toss the strainer inside the bowl with vinegar for 5 minutes. Use a toothbrush or a cloth to scrub off the mesh. Clean the strainer’s surface gently till all stains are gone.

Rinse off the vinegar from the strainer. You will notice that the strainer will have this new shiny look after cleaning.

Tip: wash the strainer with baking soda and water to eliminate vinegar taste.

Cleaning a fine-mesh strainer is no easy task. Those tiny mesh holes can be so unforgiving. Let us understand how to ease the cleaning headache associated with fine mesh strainers.

The first thing you should do immediately after using these sieves is banging them against the sink. This will remove the smaller debris that hasn’t stuck up on the holes. You can then soak the strainer in some hot soapy water for half an hour. The water should not be too hot as the strainers’ metal handles can overheat and plastics melt away.

After a good soak, place the strainer upside down under the faucet and let the running water pass over it. You can even toss the strainer in the dishwasher at this point, but It’s not very recommended. Food particles from other dishes can get stuck on the strainer’s holes, making it more difficult to clean.

With a sponge, toothbrush, or a scrubbing brush, clean the strainer thoroughly and have a sprayer at hand to help you dislodge any stuck particles on the meshes. If you are using the toothbrush, make sure you sterilize it in sodium hydroxide-water(hot) solution before you start using it on the strainer.  Scrub both sides of the strainer and rinse off with clean water.

Dry your strainer effectively before storing it. The towel-drying method is effective but may leave some moisture accumulating between meshes. Leaving the strainer to air-dry is the best drying solution.

Do not let your strainer look unappealing with stains stuck on it. Not only will it look unattractive but also unhygienic. With the above cleaning methods, I hope the process will be much easier. Now it is time to act and eliminate those stains before they stick hard. Remember, the harder the stains, the harder the cleaning becomes.

Rita C. Donnell (Jennifer) has spent the last 26 years studying and practicing nutrition science. She has used a larger part of this time in improving people’s livelihoods. She has done so by coming up with unquestionable ideas on how to tackle food problems in her community. Readmore