If you’re a professional cleaner or maid and looking to go the extra mile for your clients, consider cleaning their coffee maker! More than likely, it hasn’t been cleaned in a while. 

 

Which is a shame because it should be cleaned once every month to ensure a delicious and delectable cup of coffee every morning. Not to mention that a coffee maker is an excellent place for bacteria and mold to grow. Who wants to drink something that is made in a giant bacteria petri dish? Absolutely, no one. 

 

So here are three easy steps on how to clean a coffee maker. (Scroll farther down to see how to clean a coffee pot because it is slightly different).

 

Instructions on how to clean a coffee maker:

1. Make sure to clean all the components.

Any part of the coffee maker you can remove needs to be cleaned. It's easy just to wash the pot, the filter, and maybe clean out a few leftover grinds, but for that professional clean you need to wash entirely every piece you can.

 

You can wash all the components by hand in the sink if you'd like, but they usually are dishwasher safe, and tossing them in with the other dishes will do the job just fine.

 

When drying the pot, it is best to leave the lid open because any extra moisture trapped in the pot after cleaning will become a beacon for those pesky germs to return. 

 

2. Wash the coffee maker out with white vinegar.

The water used to make coffee every morning leaves a calcium deposit inside the coffee maker from hard minerals. If the coffee maker seems to drip slower than usual, this calcification is probably the cause. But not to worry because it's a real easy fix.

 

Inside the reservoir where you'd place the water to brew a pot (generally in the back of the machine), just mix a solution of equal parts white vinegar and water. From there you're going to place an empty coffee filter and brew half of the solution. For example, if you put 8 cups in the reservoir, only brew four cups.

 

Once you’ve brewed half the solution, turn off the coffee maker and let it sit for 30 minutes. Once 30 minutes have passed, finish brewing the rest of the solution and dump out the pot when done.

 

Replace the coffee filter with a clean one, put back the empty pot, and fill the reservoir again with clean water. Brew that entire pot of water and repeat the whole cycle again if needed.

 

What a great way to clean out the internal parts of the coffee maker without having do hardly any work at all!

 

3. Clean the pot out!

This may seem obvious but not many people clean the pot out thoroughly. But since you’re a professional, delivering a thorough clean is the name of your game.

 

A coffee pot should be rinsed out after every use. But if you want to make that coffee pot get back that extra sparkle, just fill it with warm water and a little bit of rice. Then give the mixture a good swirl to loosen up any stubborn residues and stains.

 

Scrub with a sponge to peel off and remove any debris, rinse thoroughly, and ouala! That coffee pot will be a beacon of light in your clean kitchen. Not a beacon of germs.

 

Instructions to clean a Keurig:

Cleaning a Keurig is really not that different from cleaning a regular coffee maker. But there are some slight differences, and it may take some more time.

 

1. UNPLUG THE MACHINE!

Once again, unplug the machine!

 

2. Disassemble and wash all the removable parts.

All removable parts of the Keurig include the water reservoir and its lid, the mug stand, and the K-cup holder. Wash all of these with warm soapy water and dry.

 

3. Wipe down the machine.

With a clean and damp cloth, wipe down the machine. A lot of coffee grounds collect in the space where you insert the pod so make sure to clean that out as well. Replace all the clean parts you removed earlier and plug the machine back in.

 

4. Rinse with white vinegar.

Just like we mentioned above with the regular coffee pot, you're going to put a solution of equal parts white vinegar and water into the reservoir of the Keurig. Then run the machine without a K-cup as many times as needed to empty the reservoir. Just toss the mugs of white vinegar solution you'll be brewing, and you're all done!

 

Following these steps will make sure you give any coffee maker a professional grade A clean. Your hard work will be noticed the following morning when a more delicious and refreshed cup of joe is made.

 

Don’t forget to check out our other cleaning tips and guides we have here at Handy! Thanks for reading and happy cleaning!