Home cleaning of elegant cutlery
On a daily basis we usually use ordinary, cheap cutlery, but in many homes, or at least during Christmas meals, the tables are equipped with elegant stainless steel cutlery and even rhodium silver. In as many places, however, they are not used because they are usually covered with an unaesthetic, discouraging coating, and yet no elaborate chemicals are needed to clean them, because you only need what you will find in every kitchen.
We clean silver or stainless steel cutlery similarly and in both cases we resign from wires and rough sponges, because their use leaves scratches, which later on make it easier for each raid to penetrate. We wash them with cotton or flannel cloths, moistened during washing, dry to polish.
A simple way to clean cutlery
The easiest way is water with vinegar or salt, but the solution does not have to be very acidic or salty, because 1-1.5 tablespoons of substance per litre of hot water is enough. Only when the raid is stronger, it is necessary to strengthen its effect, creating a mixture based on 3 litres of water with 4 tablespoons of purified soda and 5 tablespoons of vinegar.
Soak the cutlery in such prepared liquid for at least 15 minutes to half an hour, and after removal, rinse in cool water, wipe dry and polish with a soft cloth.
We always try to adapt the cleaning method to the degree of soiling. If the cutlery is not dirty, but only "not fresh", it should be enough to soak it in water from boiled potatoes, spinach or rhubarb to give it a good appearance. The ascorbic acid, vitamin C, dissolved in such water, has a brightening effect and easily removes ordinary matt metal objects.
Heavily soiled cutlery
A larger, more visible bloom, for example after coffee or tea, can be treated in two ways. The first one, non-invasive but time-consuming, consists in soaking them for one hour in buttermilk, the second one will work well with a damp cloth sprinkled with salt or soda. Such a method will be effective especially in case of point dirt and pits, and in this case even toothpaste or cleansing milk may be used, but it may leave scratches and in order to prevent it, it is worth to use a slightly more sophisticated method:
It is a pap made of crushed chalk and alcohol, which is wrapped around cutlery for several minutes and although it seems time-consuming, the results after rinsing, drying and polishing will be sensational.
It is worth remembering that cutlery is used for food and that is why the use of household potions is the safest, because it does not expose us in any way to contact with unwanted chemical substances.
Last but not least, the elegant ones are best kept in closed boxes lined with soft fabric.
