By: Esther Pransky, Lubicom Marketing Staff
It’s an insult to your immaculate kitchen.
A blow to your balabusta-hood.
What IS that yucky white stuff on your urn, and how can you get rid of it?
Know your enemy
That yucky, white stuff has a polite name. It’s called “limescale.”
Limescale is a milky white deposit found where hot water has evaporated. It especially likes to collect in tiny, hard to reach crevices.
That includes kettles, water heaters, and, yes, unfortunately, your new urn.
Limescale is made up of the minerals in the water that got left behind after the water evaporated. So, if your water is “hard,” meaning contains a lot of minerals, you’ll see the limescale building up fast.
It’s not dangerous to your food, but it can clog up the dispenser. And it looks awful.
How NOT to clean your urn
Before we get to the trick we promised, here’s a look at the well-meaning advice that you should IGNORE.
Don’t:
– Scrub the limescale away. It’s way too much unnecessary work.
– Use specially made cleaning solutions. They’re effective, but you’re filling your urn with chemicals.
– Boil up vinegar to clean your urn. It will work well – but then your whole house will smell like vinegar. Not to mention your next cup of coffee.
The magic trick
Finally, here’s what to do to get rid of limescale and reclaim your shiny urn:
1. Buy some citric acid powder (aka sour salt), a powdered form of the natural acid found in fruits. It’s readily available and kosher.
2. Pour about a third of a cup into the urn, fill the rest with water, and bring to a boil.
3. Empty the urn after half an hour. The limescale will simply peel away.
4. Run a batch of clean water through the urn.
Voila! You’re done.
Your urn is now the envy of the neighborhood, and you can sit down to a well-deserved mug of hazelnut coffee.
If only it were this easy to keep your floor clean. . .
Best Tip ever – new question Thanks for this simple and effective tip. I have done this on my city urn and country urn, even on a stovetop teakettle and its magic. I recently purchased a new Urn and the water has a metallic taste. I tried changing the water a few times but it still has this metallic taste. Any advice on how to eliminate the taste? There is no limescale in this urn as it is brand new.
Cleaning your Urn I live in Israel, and “hard water” is part of life here. I have stopped using citric acid to clean my electric kettle and Shabbos urn, after ruining them using citric acid. It is called acid because that is what it is (it’s a great way to get rid of rust stains from the stone floors and sinks!). After repeated use, the acid wears away the rubber seals and causes leaks and sometimes short circuits. If the kettles continues to work it is just for a short time and eventually has be to replaced. I have switched to using vinegar. While there is the smell of vinegar during the treatment (You allow the water and vinegar to boil till the stone is gone), but it dissipates shortly after. And as with the citric acid, you must rinse the urn or kettle well (I once forgot to after using citric acid and when I went to make coffee, the milk curdled). There is no aftertaste or smell. It takes about the same amount of time as the citric acid treatments. I offer my advice after several years of experience and several kettles in the trash. Each person should make their own decision of course and in the end it is all good.
Do you just use vinegar or a combination of vinegar and water?