cleaning your dutch oven

[bobhenry]

I know I know it's and old thread but I had an experience at our spring gathering a couple day ago that I gotta tell.......

We finished the Sausage Biscuits and gravey Sat AM and being lazy and in a hurry to visit I simply left the 8 or so tablespoons of left overs in my dutch oven and added water to boil. Well we set it on the campfire and went to the facilities for a potty break and visited on the way back. I returned to a boiled dry d.o. that was a mess. The gravy was now a heavy carboned blob welded to the sides. The smell was terrible and no amount of reboiling and scrubbing [and scrubbing ] was gonna remove this mess. I was in a mild panic as I really needed this iron to prepare the pitch in dinner in a few hours.

Enter plan D or was it E or F anyway now desperate I picked up 20 or so smaller pieces of gravel and with my 3rd scotch brite pad ground and grouned on the carbon barnicals that had adhered themselves to the pot. Little progress was being made so I

..... spare the smaller children and pets.....

Squirted in about 3 ounces of charcoal lighter fluid and a healthy squirt of dish soap.

The starter was the key, It seemed to simply desolve the carbon in the burnt on mass.
By using the gravel and the pad with this combo the burnt on mess finally gave up. I was very suprised as the seasoning was only polished a bit but still very much in tact . One more soap and water washing and then a hot water boil and rinse and a quick wipe out and a spray of veggie oil and it was good to go.

Do I recommend this method NO but when your up against the wall you do what ya gotta do.