How Often to Clean a Barbecue Grill

For health and safety reasons, not to mention the taste of the food, a barbecue grill should be treated just like you treat your kitchen stove. Clean it after every meal preparation.

How to Regularly Clean Your Grill

During the height of grilling season, it’s important to clean your grill after every use. That means cleaning food particles off the grates as well as cleaning the grill brush or scraper itself. Depending on the style of grill you have, the regular maintenance required might vary. To clean a gas grill, you should empty the drip pan every time. For charcoal grills, be sure to brush out the bricks and ash after it cools to prevent buildup blocking the grill vents or causing flare up issues.

After cooking, always be sure to:

• Heat the grill on high setting for at least 15 minutes to carbonize any food fragments.
• While it’s hot, scrape off all food remnants from the grates using a metal scraper, wood scraper, or grill brush to scrub from every angle.
• Finish by mopping the grates with a paper towel soaked in canola oil using tongs (crucial to season the grates, prevent sticking next time around, and ward off any rust).

How To Clean the BBQ grill with newspaper and steam

Lynsey Queen of Clean (opens in new tab) has a neat trick with newspaper to clean a caked-on BBQ grill. Allow your barbecue to cool slightly, but while it’s still warm, lay a sheet of old newspaper across the top and generously spritz with water. Close the lid for half an hour to steam clean it.

Lynsey explains, ‘Grab one sheet of newspaper and pop it on the BBQ you’ve been using and just get a spray bottle of water and spray the newspaper. Pop the lid back on and what will happen is this will give your BBQ a steam clean. It will start to release all that grease, all that fat and all those bits from the food.