How to Clean a BBQ Grill

Grime and fat accumulate on barbecue grills during the summer months.

No one wants to eat food cooked in a dirty pan. Yet outdoor cooks often allow barbecue grills to accumulate an entire season's worth of grime without a second thought. Cleaning out the dirt, grease and other debris will extend the life of your grill and ensure the food is healthier.

Things You'll Need

• Protective gloves
• Hammer
• Nonmetal scrubbing gear
• Old tooth brush
• Trash bags
• Wire brush
• Ammonia or oven spray

Instructions

1. Put on protective gloves. Remove the top of your grill. Normally this is merely a hinge pin that will either pull out or tap out with a small hammer and a stiff wire. Spray it with ammonia or oven cleaner and set aside.

2. Remove the grates. Handle them with care. Most modern barbecue grills have porcelain-coated grates. These chip very easily and that causes food to stick on them. Set the grates aside.

3. Remove the burner assembly. Inspect it carefully for cracks, corrosion and obstructions. Anything that obstructs it must be removed, and cracked units must be replaced. Corrosion can be brushed off as long as it doesn't create a hole.

4. Remove the controls. Perform the same inspection on the controls as you did on the burner assemblies.

5. Spray the bottom with ammonia or oven cleaner.

6. Scrub the top and bottom with a wire brush after the oven cleaner or ammonia has had a chance to soak in. The soaking can take anywhere from minutes to hours depending on how thick the crust is.

7. Place grates in trash bag and add ammonia. Or, you can coat the grates with oven cleaner. Either way, you want to seal in the fumes to enhance the cleaning power. Leave them in the bag overnight for best results.

8. Clean the controls and burner assembly with an old toothbrush and ammonia. It won't take much. In fact, burner units are fairly inexpensive, and a lot of outdoor cooks simply replace them every year.

9. Scrub and then rinse everything before reassembly.

Tips & Warnings

• You can repaint the inside of the newly cleaned top and bottom. Use two coats at a minimum and be sure it is a high-heat-resistant paint.

• An optional tool would be a portable steam cleaner. The product would remove most of the drudgery of cleaning your barbecue grill.

• Ammonia and oven cleaner are toxic. Make sure you use them outdoors. Take precautions to prevent getting them in your eyes or ingesting them.

References

• Grilling 24 x 7: How to Clean Your Charcoal Grill