Roasting pot novice question

[sanfairyanne]

Please can anyone help?
I have just spent three days cleaning my mothers oven. My mother has very little pride in keeping the kitchen clean. Whenever I visit I do the best I can to help out. It crossed my mind that the oven must be getting oil splatters when she roasts potatoes or a chicken in an open roasting tray. I thought about buying her a roasting pot (picture attached). I have seen some of these pots with a wire tray (attached picture), the meat would sit on the tray. I assume this allows the heat to mix evenly. With my limited knowledge of cooking I assume if you wanted to roast potatoes they would have to be sitting in the juice from the chicken. So a wire tray would be no use. The white roasting pot in the picture is enamelled and has no wire tray. Can anyone suggest if this would provide a good way of cooking a roast chicken with roast potatoes. Also am I right in saying that an enamelled pot will be easier to clean than a stainless steel one. Perhaps this method isn't recommended at all. It did cross my mind that perhaps a chicken might not cook so well if it is fully enclose in a pot. Any advice would be much appreciated. Many thanks in advance.

 

[rascal]

I have something similar but I don't use the top part of it.
I get a lady that comes twice a year for $50 a time she cleans it. In under 30 mins.

Russ

 

[sanfairyanne]

I have something similar but I don't use the top part of it.
I get a lady that comes twice a year for $50 a time she cleans it. In under 30 mins.

Russ

Well she must have some amazing cleaning products. The stuff I bought says it has between 5-10% sodium hydroxide but it's garbage. I've tried mixing caustic soda with water (apparently it makes a good cleaner) nothing works like it claims to. I'm in the UK, so maybe elsewhere you can get more powerful cleaning agents. I eventually removed the worst bits with a sharp razor blade. I was able to do this without scratching the enamel. Even so, it still took at least 12 hours.

 

[rascal]

Well she must have some amazing cleaning products. The stuff I bought says it has between 5-10% sodium hydroxide but it's garbage. I've tried mixing caustic soda with water (apparently it makes a good cleaner) nothing works like it claims to. I'm in the UK, so maybe elsewhere you can get more powerful cleaning agents. I eventually removed the worst bits with a sharp razor blade. I was able to do this without scratching the enamel. Even so, it still took at least 12 hours.

My oven is only about 3 years old. I will ask what she uses next time.
Although she prolly wont reveal her secret.?

Russ

 

[Morning Glory]

Well she must have some amazing cleaning products. The stuff I bought says it has between 5-10% sodium hydroxide but it's garbage. I've tried mixing caustic soda with water (apparently it makes a good cleaner) nothing works like it claims to. I'm in the UK, so maybe elsewhere you can get more powerful cleaning agents. I eventually removed the worst bits with a sharp razor blade. I was able to do this without scratching the enamel. Even so, it still took at least 12 hours.

In the UK you can get 'oven cleaning companies' to do it all for you. And yes, they know what they are doing. It generally costs about £50 to get the oven cleaned. You can get cooker hood cleaned too. They do it so well that the oven looks virtually like new. Its really a question of whether you can afford it. But I would recommend it if you can. Once or twice a year is enough, depending on on how often the oven is used. Google 'oven wizards' or similar...

 

[garlichead]

I didn't know paying someone to clean your oven was a thing......dang, thanks for the heads up. I'll still be cleaning my own oven though because I'm like that lol.

 

[flyinglentris]

Please can anyone help?
I have just spent three days cleaning my mothers oven. My mother has very little pride in keeping the kitchen clean. Whenever I visit I do the best I can to help out. It crossed my mind that the oven must be getting oil splatters when she roasts potatoes or a chicken in an open roasting tray. I thought about buying her a roasting pot (picture attached). I have seen some of these pots with a wire tray (attached picture), the meat would sit on the tray. I assume this allows the heat to mix evenly. With my limited knowledge of cooking I assume if you wanted to roast potatoes they would have to be sitting in the juice from the chicken. So a wire tray would be no use. The white roasting pot in the picture is enamelled and has no wire tray. Can anyone suggest if this would provide a good way of cooking a roast chicken with roast potatoes. Also am I right in saying that an enamelled pot will be easier to clean than a stainless steel one. Perhaps this method isn't recommended at all. It did cross my mind that perhaps a chicken might not cook so well if it is fully enclose in a pot. Any advice would be much appreciated. Many thanks in advance.View attachment 74936
View attachment 74937

The roasting pot you picture looks OK, if it is big enough for a turkey. When I was a kid, mom used what was called a 'Big Blue' roaster, a very large cheap squarish roasting pot that would fit enormous stuff.

Keeping an oven clean is always a baneful thing. I recently got myself a Cosori multi-function toaster oven to get out of that and clean the oven immediately after use as if it were just another dish or pot.

 

[flyinglentris]

I recently learned that baking soda can be used as a cleaner for ovens and ovenware.

 

[sanfairyanne]

I recently learned that baking soda can be used as a cleaner for ovens and ovenware.

I'll give it a try, thanks.

 

[sanfairyanne]

I didn't know paying someone to clean your oven was a thing......dang, thanks for the heads up. I'll still be cleaning my own oven though because I'm like that lol.

In the UK there's a company that sends a guy out with a van, he strips down the oven and puts all the dirty parts in a bath in his van. When he rebuilds the oven it looks immaculate. The downside is that it costs around £100 whereas a roasting pot costs just £20.

 

[MrsDangermouse]

In the UK there's a company that sends a guy out with a van, he strips down the oven and puts all the dirty parts in a bath in his van. When he rebuilds the oven it looks immaculate. The downside is that it costs around £100 whereas a roasting pot costs just £20.

Where do you live? That's very expensive unless its for a range-type of oven. Around here (which is generally considered a pretty expensive area) it costs about £45 for a single oven or £60 for a double one.

You can buy a product called Oven Pride which is more effective than most other cleaners....but it takes hours, is a messy job and its nasty caustic stuff that'll burn your skin if you're not careful. Its really not worth it - just get the professionals in once a year.

A roasting pot won't really help keep the oven that much cleaner unless she always roasts with the lid on....but in that case it would be more of a pot roast or braise than a true roast (eg. you wouldn't get properly crispy chicken skin) so its not a particularly good solution in my opinion. Also, you can't roast potatoes in a closed pot...again, they won't get properly crispy.

 

[sanfairyanne]

I live in the north of England, but I only know about this £100 job because a friend had it done, he lives in Cornwall.
I tried Oven Pride (and two different versions) neither of them did much good. This is odd, because last year I cleaned the oven and that type of product was pretty good. Apparently 100g of caustic soda in 1ltr of water makes the same product, though it stays as a liquid and not a more viscous jelly like Oven Pride. Needless to say my caustic soda mix did nothing either. I've ended up using a brand new razor blade to carefully remove the worst. Then I use Oven Pride over and over again. It's a crazy laborious task. I'm going to buy my mother a roasting pot today.

 

[Morning Glory]

I live in the north of England, but I only know about this £100 job because a friend had it done, he lives in Cornwall.

You can get it much cheaper. The going price is around £50. You will never get the oven to look as clean as this achieves however much elbow grease you use. This is an extract from https://www.checkatrade.com/blog/cost-guides/oven-cleaning-prices/ (for 2021)

 

[sanfairyanne]

You can get it much cheaper. The going price is around £50. You will never get the oven to look as clean as this achieves however much elbow grease you use. This is an extract from https://www.checkatrade.com/blog/cost-guides/oven-cleaning-prices/ (for 2021)

View attachment 74980

Thanks I've made a note of that link. I've finally managed to get the oven somewhat close to clean. The main point of my post though, was to ask about roasting pans (as pictured in my first post). I'm hoping that by using one of these the fat won't reach the sides of the oven in the first place. I don't know anyone who's used one, there are plenty of instances of people using them to roast a chicken, but I don't know if they're practical to roast both a chicken and roast potatoes at the same time. I'm just going to buy her one and try to get her to use it.
Incidentally, I just put my post code in to the CheckaTrade website (I'm close to Liverpool) It says there are NO oven cleaners in my area

 

[Morning Glory]

The main point of my post though, was to ask about roasting pans (as pictured in my first post). I'm hoping that by using one of these the fat won't reach the sides of the oven in the first place. I don't know anyone who's used one, there are plenty of instances of people using them to roast a chicken, but I don't know if they're practical to roast both a chicken and roast potatoes at the same time.

My thoughts are that it will certainly cook the chicken and potatoes but in order to brown the chicken and get crispy potatoes you would need to take the lid off for the last 20 mins or so. This, of course, defeats the object of using the pot to stop grease in the oven! I don't think there is much of a way around this.

I just put my post code in to the CheckaTrade website (I'm close to Liverpool) It says there are NO oven cleaners in my area

If you are near Liverpool there are bound to be some. I'd simply try Googling 'oven cleaning services'.