The Best Kitchen Cleaning Tools & Tips For 2023 | Gear Heads

Hannah and Lisa show you how you stock your kitchen with the very best cleaning supplies and give you their top cleaning tips and hacks.

Hannah's Picks:

Lisa's Picks:

ABOUT US: Located in Boston’s Seaport District in the historic Innovation and Design Building, America's Test Kitchen features 15,000 square feet of kitchen space including multiple photography and video studios. It is the home of Cook’s Illustrated magazine and Cook’s Country magazine and is the workday destination for more than 60 test cooks, editors, and cookware specialists. Our mission is to test recipes over and over again until we understand how and why they work and until we arrive at the best version.

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[mrhumpty]

When she says those William Sonoma dish towels are durable like jeans. She is 100% right. I received 8 towels as a gift over 20 years ago. I still have them. They've faded... but they still work just fine. They are more pricey than others... but they will last and last and last. It still blows my mind that I haven't bought new towels in all these years.

[Splagnate]

Congratulations Hannah! The best of health to you and your bun!😁

[jullesadams]

I'm confirming that indeed I'm super satisfied with the excellent quality of all the things I've bought based on your recommendations. You go girls

[christinerenee]

I have that little dishwasher! I'm proud of myself for picking the one that is apparently the best.

[jeanne-marie]

I always look forward to these videos. As a self-professed “nerd”, the test method information, is very comforting. I know the items have been “put through the ringer”, before I buy them. It makes me feel that anything I do to them, will be tolerated!

[mcjohn]

The single thing uniting the human race is that each of us is secretly convinced we are the only ones in the household who know how to load the dishwasher.

[benmishkin]

We bought the larger of the recommended dishwashers that hooks up to a sink a few weeks ago and we are kicking ourselves for not getting one sooner. It works so well and saves us so much time - we've been cooking more and cooking healthier because cleanup is no longer such a chore. I don't think I've ever bought anything that had a higher happiness to dollars spent ratio.

[purplegill]

10:52 THIS IS SO IMPORTANT TO REMEMBER! Vinegar-based cleaners do NOT disinfect anything but are fantastic at getting actual grime off of surfaces. If you need to disinfect something then it's far better to use chemical cleaners or, if you're willing to do a bit of work in diluting, bleach and water.

[teresacoffman]

First, I have that B&D vacuum and I love that I can actually WASH the parts to clean it. Second, an oven cleaner that many people overlook is the cleaner for your glasstop stove. It lifts so much of the messes in my oven. I have even used it on the glass in the oven door. Sometimes I have used the included razor (in its safety holder) to scrape difficult stains and baked on oils.

[MistSoalar]

Vacuum: We ended up Makita handheld after trying several Black&Decker products. We're okay with storing extensions and attachments separately, and having more 3rd party attachments gave us more freedom. Also the replacement filter is much cheaper.

Spray Mops: Seeing janitors around office buildings, we concluded spray and mops are better divorced. Swiffer's non-spray mop can take most cheap-o microfiber towels. We also found dish soaps work amazingly well on any kitchen surfaces.

[virginiaf.]

I attach old towels or cleaning rags to my Swiffer mop, rather than buying those pads. Then I use a spray bottle with whatever cleaning fluid I'm using and spray manually. Gets a better amount of cleaner on the floor than the little spray attachment. Also, I use Easy Off on my stainless steel cookware. Works great to get them nice and shiny again.

[kimlindseyOH]

Thanks ladies! I always learn something useful from your videos!
My favorite for dish towels is 100% linen - hard to find these days but super absorbent.
Also, re: Swiffer: I put a couple strips of stick-on velcro (the "hook" part, not the soft "loop" part) onto the bottom surface of a plain swiffer dust mop, and now I can use any microfiber cloth with it: I just smooth the cloth over the velcro, turn the mop right side up and push a bit of the cloth edges into the 4 holes on the top, and I'm good to go - and it's reusable. It's been working well for me for several years now; easy & inexpensive.

[kcc]

Highly pleased with Lisa’s recommendation of the Quickie bottle brush, it’s amazing! Perfect length, width, and density to feel like it’s actually scrubbing all sides of the bottle with minimal effort. I threw away all my old useless ones and will never look back. Thanks Lisa!

[davehallock]

So I am a huge Lisa fan. I have purchased a number of things she has recommended and all have been great. Just got the little dishwasher, ordered the towels and Tuesday the bottle brush will be here. Thank you so darn much!.👍👍👍👍

[benamisai-kham]

I like this channel because it's like a review version of the shopping channel, which I find comforting and unintentionally ASMR.

[mjremy]

Hannah, I love that tip about the vinegar and baking soda for drains. I have lots of both. Vinegar is great at Costco. White Vinegar runs $4 for 2 gals! Apple Cider Vinegar (both are for cooking use) runs $6 for 3 bottles.
That dishwasher looks so cute. Nice to know. Would fit in an RV too, heh heh.

Lisa, I am definitely buying the bottle brush. I really appreciate this tip as I would think that OXO would be better. Not so.

[SandyMasquith]

Thanks! Lots of great ideas here. I recently discovered the true wonder of distilled vinegar when cleaning my kitchen sink and disposall. Stuff does a treat to knock out any weird smells. For the disposall, I made a mixture of vinegar with some canola oil (didn't actually mix them per se). The vinegar to scrub and the canola to lubricate the moving parts. Next time I'll use the baking powder + vinegar first, then the canola oil. Seriously, vinegar is a miracle cleaning agent!

[winros]

That's an excellent idea!! Smash your oven door to get a new one!! You go, girl!!!

[Trains-With-Shane]

The cheesy 1950's style infomercial pitch for the vinegar made me lol. Love it!

[jekku]

Yah Hannah and Lisa! Vinegar for the win! Long handled brush and cotton towels for the win! Use these all the time myself (BTW, add a couple drops of dish soap to your vinegar spray to help clean even better). Great tips, ladies! Congrats on the "bun" Hannah!