How To Clean Inside A Gas Grill

After a while, a gas grill can get pretty gross. We often don’t associate a gas grill with something that needs to be cleaned because it’s not charcoal and does not leave a mess when burned. You will still encounter baked-on food, grease burned onto the grill, and the grill pan occasionally catching fire when food particles and oils are left. This doesn’t even extend to the smell of dirty ingredients inside your gas grill. 

Before cleaning the gas grills, turn off the gas. This is a must. If the grill accidentally ignites while cleaning, that can cause injuries and property damage. You should be able to switch off the gas by locating the valves near your grill and turning them off.

Discover how you can clean the inside of a gas grill.

Remove the Grill Grates

Remove the grill grates if they are not attached to your grill. Though you want to clean them, for the moment, we’ll set them aside and focus strictly on the inside of the gas grill. If you want to keep your hands clean, wear latex gloves.

Your gas grill probably has more metal pieces than your grill grates. Remove those, too. These metal plates cover gas burners. They usually catch grease and grime as it falls from the grates. Once again, these will need cleaning, but for the moment, let’s focus on inside the gas grill.

Remove Any Loose Debris

Start cleaning the inside of a gas grill by removing any loose debris, such as dirt or food that isn’t caked on. You may do this manually or with a handheld vacuum cleaner. In most cases, a couple of rags should work fine, but you will need to go to the source before removing anything.

Put your grill grates and metal pieces in hot water and soap. You can soak them in a sink or put them in a plastic bin if they’re too large. This will prevent you from vigorously scrubbing and scratching your grill to clean them. If you soak everything in hot soapy water, most of what’s attached to the material will fall off or, at the very least, be easier to remove.

Check Your Grill Grates and Metals in 30 Minutes

Let your gas grill grates soak for 30 minutes. If it’s been months since your last gas grill was cleaned, you may need to add new water and soap after the first 30 minutes. You may need to repeat this soak twice or thrice to remove everything from the grill grates and metal platforms.

After the soak, wipe everything down with a warm rag. Use a rag or towel if you don’t mind getting extremely dirty. The gunk that comes off a gas grill, or any grill for that matter, can prove challenging to clean off with the rags and towels used to clean a grill.

Scrub with Your Grill Brush

If stains or debris are not coming off, you may want to scrub your gas grill grates with a grill brush. As we mentioned earlier, what has not come off during the soak will probably not take much effort to release from the grates post-soak. The grill brush is an important tool, though. It’s tough enough to remove debris you need to be gone but won’t damage your grates.

If oil or grease is not coming off, try a half-and-half solution of vinegar and water. Always dilute the vinegar. What this half-and-half solution will do is that the acidic properties of the vinegar will cut through the grease and let you wipe it away without any trouble.

Try Baking Soda and Water

If you’ve run through these steps and there are still dirty parts inside your gas grill, you can mix baking soda and water to form a paste. Use three parts baking soda to one part water. This paste can then be applied to problematic areas on your grill. 

Though you will need a lot to cover your whole grill, we recommend only using this as a backup in troublesome areas. Baking soda and water will reduce grease and baked-on food and eliminate much of the effort to tidy up your gas grill.

When you apply the paste, let it sit for thirty minutes. It will accumulate what it needs in that time. You shouldn’t need to use chemical solutions or chemical cleaners to clean the inside of a gas grill.