What do you hate to clean?

[gfron1]

We all work too hard here in the P&B forum. So, I wanted to take a little break and ask what you hate to clean in your P&B kitchen.

Top of mind is the mixer bowl after making bread, but I don't think that's my LEAST favorite. I would have to say a pot of crystallized sugar after I messed up a caramel or syrup.

What's yours?

(btw, if you have an intern, there's nothing you hate to clean )

[AmberM]

Hi- this is my first post!

I think my most hated thing to clean is a tie between the dough sheeter and my Kook-E-King......both are a tremendous pain in the a**!

[Chris Hennes]

Piping bags, hands down, especially the big ones that don't fit really well in my sink. After a buttercream, when they get all greasy inside? Yuck. I need an intern...

[alanamoana]

  Chris Hennes said:

Piping bags, hands down, especially the big ones that don't fit really well in my sink. After a buttercream, when they get all greasy inside? Yuck. I need an intern...

←

thus my completely lazy and un-ecologically sound use of DISPOSABLE PIPING BAGS!!!

anything that is oversized is my enemy: 60+ qt mixer bowls, etc.

anything that is undersized is also my enemy: little tiny tartlette molds

so, pretty much anything i have to clean

[K8memphis]

Chris, turn your piping bag inside out. I mean they are flexible, dude. The biggest piping bag would fit easy peasy in a hand sink. Geez I love telling a rocket scientist what to do !!!

But yeah, parchment is the way to go, those plastic disposable ones are too slippery for me.

[K8memphis]

  gfron1 said:

We all work too hard here in the P&B forum.  So, I wanted to take a little break and ask what you hate to clean in your P&B kitchen.

Top of mind is the mixer bowl after making bread, but I don't think that's my LEAST favorite.  I would have to say a pot of crystallized sugar after I messed up a caramel or syrup.

What's yours?

(btw, if you have an intern, there's nothing you hate to clean  )

←

I think what I hated most is not having an intern.

[pastrygirl]

  K8memphis said:

But yeah, parchment is the way to go, those plastic disposable ones are too slippery for me.

←

Wear disposable latex gloves while handling your slippery disposable plastic piping bags - extra gripping and extra wasteful! Seriously, it works, no sweaty hands.

I hate that my assistants don't use a plastic bowl scraper to scrape the extra dough out of the bowl before washing it, and instead get the steel wool and sponges all mucked up with wet dough then don't clean them out, but I suppose that's different from hating to clean the mixing bowls.

I hate to clean up raw eggs dropped on the walk-in floor, it's about a 9 paper towel job for one lousy egg, and the nonskid texture of the floor makes it seem impossible to get it all. Oh, and I hate cleaning buttercream out of a big Hobart whip. PIA.

I love to clean up chocolate hardened onto stainless tables by melting it with the propane torch and chasing with a wet cloth. Fire is fun!

[judec]

The bottom of my oven.

There's enough cornmeal and burnt flour in it to fill a sandbox.

[jsmeeker]

  Chris Hennes said:

Piping bags, hands down, especially the big ones that don't fit really well in my sink. After a buttercream, when they get all greasy inside? Yuck. I need an intern...

←

I made some gougeres yesterday, so I had to deal with this myself yesterday. Yeah, it's a pain. Every time I do some piping, I tell myself to go get some disposable bags. I still haven't don't. Really, I should.

[pastrymama]

  pastrygirl said:

  K8memphis said:

But yeah, parchment is the way to go, those plastic disposable ones are too slippery for me.

←

Wear disposable latex gloves while handling your slippery disposable plastic piping bags - extra gripping and extra wasteful! Seriously, it works, no sweaty hands.

I hate that my assistants don't use a plastic bowl scraper to scrape the extra dough out of the bowl before washing it, and instead get the steel wool and sponges all mucked up with wet dough then don't clean them out, but I suppose that's different from hating to clean the mixing bowls.

I hate to clean up raw eggs dropped on the walk-in floor, it's about a 9 paper towel job for one lousy egg, and the nonskid texture of the floor makes it seem impossible to get it all. Oh, and I hate cleaning buttercream out of a big Hobart whip. PIA.

I love to clean up chocolate hardened onto stainless tables by melting it with the propane torch and chasing with a wet cloth. Fire is fun!

←

To clean up eggs, sprinkle well with salt, let it set a few seconds then pick it up. It keeps the whites from spreading so much.

Edited May 27, 2008 by pastrymama (log)

[AmberM]

  jsmeeker said:

I made some gougeres yesterday, so I had to deal with this myself yesterday.  Yeah, it's a pain.  Every time I do some piping, I tell myself to go get some disposable bags.  I still haven't don't.  Really, I should. 

←

Okay, you just reminded me of an old peeve....try cleaning dried pate a choux out of a pastry bag that your irresponsible co-worker left for you. Or syrup carelessly sprayed all over the 60qt mixer by another co-worker while making Italian meringue. And no, I was not an apprentice or intern- just the only one who bothered to clean!

[gfron1]

Oh! I remember a doozy! Patrick A (our proud recent graduate) was making a blackberry reduction for me in his school kitchen and didn't hold the lid down on the blender. The top popped and blackberry juice covered the ceiling, walls, floor, and his brand new white chef's jacket (he was so proud of that jacket). What a mess. But I didn't hate cleaning it...that was my intern's job!

[melonpan]

spinach

[jsmeeker]

  AmberM said:

  jsmeeker said:

I made some gougeres yesterday, so I had to deal with this myself yesterday.  Yeah, it's a pain.  Every time I do some piping, I tell myself to go get some disposable bags.  I still haven't don't.  Really, I should. 

←

Okay, you just reminded me of an old peeve....try cleaning dried pate a choux out of a pastry bag that your irresponsible co-worker left for you. Or syrup carelessly sprayed all over the 60qt mixer by another co-worker while making Italian meringue. And no, I was not an apprentice or intern- just the only one who bothered to clean!

←

I was smart enough to wash this bag right away. (with them still baking). Turn inside out. Use as much warm soapy water as you can. Just be careful not to make a mess by getting water OUT of the sink.

[cathrynapple]

the dried choux pastry is pretty much like a glue. i hate that.

roasting pans are my least favorite. dried oatmeal. every time i cook anything i'm so excited or starving after work that it's just too much trouble to fill anything with water before i start stuffing my face.

[Peter the eater]

(start emasculated voice) I'm pretty much my wife's intern (end emasculated voice) but now that we have dozens of silicon inserts or in some cases replacements for the various pans I don't mind the clean up so much. The mini muffin tray with a six by ten array was the worst.

[maggiethecat]

  Peter the eater said:

The mini muffin tray with a six by ten array was the worst.

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Yes! Cleaning muffin pans, popover pans or tiny fluted barquette molds can make me wonder if the edible product was really worth it.

[Lior]

I have had a few mishaps that required dreaded cleaning. A large jar of honey fell off my shelf in the pantry and shattered. A huge jar of delicious and expensive marinated artichokes- which marinate in olive oil -slipped out of my greasy hands- I had the hardest time cleaning up the oil!

[sugarseattle]

  jsmeeker said:

  Chris Hennes said:

Piping bags, hands down, especially the big ones that don't fit really well in my sink. After a buttercream, when they get all greasy inside? Yuck. I need an intern...

←

I made some gougeres yesterday, so I had to deal with this myself yesterday. Yeah, it's a pain. Every time I do some piping, I tell myself to go get some disposable bags. I still haven't don't. Really, I should.

←

I just got a case of the KeeSeal Ultra displosable bags...they are textured on the outside so they work FABULOUSLY. Be sure to spend the few pennies more and get the Ultra ones...they're worth it!

[tammylc]

Agree that the KeeSeal disposable bags are great.

I hate cleaning chocolate molds. I know, i know, you're not supposed to have to, but I'm messy. And frequently have bits of colored cocoa butter that doesn't quite release perfectly. So i end up spraying and polishing at the end of each big production weekend.

With a pressure sprayer and lots of hot water, the cleaning part isn't bad. It's the polishing each individual cavity that kills me.

[JeanneCake]

Square cake pans - the corners.

The FLOOR. I hate mopping the floor. I so hate mopping the floor that the last two places I rented (shared with) I had them build it into the rent so I didn't have to worry about it. But now I don't have that luxury anymore I'm usually the last one to leave so I have to do it.

[Arey]

My glasses;Bifocals that is. Anytime I'm done cooking but have to go wash my glasses before I sit down to eat means the kitchen is a greasy sticky mess.

[pringle007]

I knocked over a nice batch of homemade marshmallow cream. I knocked it rght off the counter and it landed upside down right on top of the caddy I use to store all my colored cocoa butter and my two badgers with their parts. The mess was large, sticky, and seemed to never end

[Kerry Beal]

Glass - and blood. I opened a cupboard one day and one of the shelves came down. All sorts of corning ware, the sugar bowl, some glasses, corelle plates (they do break under the right circumstances). And me standing in my bare feet trying to hold up the shelf. I stood there bleeding from the cuts on the top of my feet, while hubby ran around vacuuming it up around me.

Never fail to find those few last pieces of glass after you stop wearing your shoes in the kitchen again...

[ejw50]

  tammylc said:

Agree that the KeeSeal disposable bags are great.

I hate cleaning chocolate molds. I know, i know, you're not supposed to have to, but I'm messy. And frequently have bits of colored cocoa butter that doesn't quite release perfectly. So i end up spraying and polishing at the end of each big production weekend.

With a pressure sprayer and lots of hot water, the cleaning part isn't bad. It's the polishing each individual cavity that kills me.

←

I second this, for the same reasons.

Related, I hate cleaning the kitchen period after making chocolates. I'm not that clean so it's always everywhere - the counter, the drawers, the floor, the microwave, the window sill - everywhere.