How do you clean a Keurig coffee machine and
how often should you do it?
That is a great question, and we're going
to talk about that today.
Hi there. I'm Angela Brown and this is Ask a House Cleaner.
This is a show where you get to ask a house
cleaning question and I get to help you find an answer.
Now if you are a homeowner and you have a
Keurig coffee machine, it uses these small
K cups. this show is for you.
And if you're an Airbnb host and you have
a Keurig machine, this show is for you.
Also, if you're a professional house cleaner
and you have Airbnb guests where you do the
turnover service or if you have a regular
household that has a Keurig coffee machine,
this show is for you.
Now as a professional house cleaner cleaning
the Keurig coffee machine.
We use these work smart, not hard tools, but
it's not a lot of expense
and it doesn't take a lot of time.
Super easy and can be done once every three
to six months and it's a great upsell if you're
putting together a package of appliances that
you're cleaning.
Or it's a great gift if somebody gives you
a referral for another customer like cleaning
out there Keurig machine is a great thank
you gift.
So let's do this.
All right.
First I'm going to take a bowl and in this
bowl I'm going to fill it up with hot water
and a little bit of dish soap.
Any dish soap will do.
Any hot water will do.
Any bowl will do.
I'm going to take all of the moving parts
from the Keurig coffee machine and I'm going
to soak them in this bowl while we clean out
the rest of the coffee machine and that way
we can get all the nooks and crannies and
all the coffee grounds out and all the fingerprints
and all the buildup.
So, every couple of months we're going to
just take everything apart and soak it for
a few minutes in some hot dish water.
I have a measuring cup and I'm going to use
a couple of cups of cleaning vinegar.
This is just the white distilled cleaning
vinegar and it's a PH balance of 2.5.
There is a professional solution you can buy
directly from Keurig.
It is also a 2.5 solution and they recommend
14 to 16 ounces.
So we're going to use that today.
I also have a gallon of bottled water and
I do recommend bottled water and we're going
to clean it with bottled water because from
here on out, if you use bottled water,
it reduces all of the minerals that come through
the regular tap water
when you're just using tap water.
All right.
To make it easy on ourselves and to reduce
the mess in the kitchen, I have a couple of
work smart, not hard tools.
One of them is a bath towel.
I'm going to put this bath towel on the kitchen
cupboard right next to the Keurig coffee machine.
Then I'm going to pull out the dish drainer
and I'm going to put it on top of the bath
towel so that I have all these moving parts.
I can just put them in the dish drainer and
they can drip dry.
All right, next I have some Q tips.
Now, Q tips will get inside all the little
nooks and crannies of the Keurig machine and
it will help me clean them.
I also have my oxo deep cleaning brush and
this is the smallest of the to the how the
triangular pointy bristles and then also the
rubber spatula at the end.
Now, this is my kitchen version that I use
in the kitchen on my kitchen appliances.
So this is the one I'm going to use today.
Not the orange one that we use the shower
when we clean
out the bottom rims of the shower doors, right?
Kitchen one for the kitchen.
Okay, so one other work smart tool I have
is a paperclip.
And as we take off the hood of the Keurig
machine, the little part where the coffee
drips through gets a lot of buildup for minerals
and coffee and we're going to take this paperclip
and poke it up in there and clear those areas.
All right.
And then to dry everything off.
I have a cotton Terry cloth, so this is all
I need in order to do the job.
Now let's go clean the coffee machine together,
shall we?
All right now we're going to go ahead and
unplug the Keurig machine and we're going
to carry it over near the kitchen sink.
The reason for this is we're going to be flushing
a lot of water through the Keurig system and
we want to make sure that we're near the sink
so that we're not carting water back and forth
across the kitchen.
Now if you'll just pop your finger underneath
the Keurig cup, that little head will pop out.
And you can see the drain there how it's a
little bit icky where mineral buildup and
coffee has splattered in it.
So we're going to take apart all the moving
parts, the base, the little water catcher
or the coffee catcher.
We're going to soak these all in our hot dish
water while we're cleaning the rest of the
coffee machine.
We're going to take apart the water reservoir.
We're going to wash the lid.
Now, this particular reservoir does not have
a water filter in it.
But if it did, this is the point at which
we would take that out so that we don't get
any soap or what have you in there.
Because there's no water filter we're going
to go ahead and put a little bit of dishwashing
soap in the reservoir itself and we're going
to use a non-scratch scrub sponge and we're
going to scrub it out.
But right now, I'm going to let it set for
just a couple of minutes while I clean the
rest of the Keurig machine.
This way it can soak and kind of let the soap
do its work.
I'm going to grab a Q tip and dip that inside
the vinegar and then go around the head where
the K cup goes inside the Keurig machine.
And we're going to pick up any loose bit and
granules of coffee or anything that have built
up inside the head of the machine.
There in the base of the machine next to where
the water reservoir has been, or underneath
the water reservoir.
We're going to use a Q tip to go all the way
around all of these little tracts where water
buildup is and maybe there are minerals or
things like that.
So we're just checking in to make sure that
there is no gunk there and then we're going
to go around all the little nooks and crannies
of the base of the machine right.
Now that we've cleaned that all out with the
vinegar, we're going to go ahead and take
the non-scratch scrub sponge and we're going
to scrub with a little bit of the dish soap.
The front and the sides of the coffee machine
itself where coffee has splattered or there
has been mineral buildup or any of the ickiness
that gets on a coffee machine just from everyday use.
Once we've done that, we're going to return
the non-scratch scrub sponge and we're going
to get our terry cloth and we're going to
dry the machine so that we don't leave any
water spots and we just can shine it up and
polish it and then we'll go ahead and return
the water reservoir to the coffee machine.
We've got to rinse it real quick because we
did have some soap in there and I'm using
the non-scratch scrub sponge just to make
sure there's nothing icky on the inside of
that water reservoir.
And again, once you do this on a regular basis
it doesn't get very icky.
And this has been well maintained.
We're going to put our vinegar in there and
we're going to put equal parts water so it's
two cups vinegar and two cups water.
And we'll put our water also in our measuring
cup to make sure that we have the right amount.
And then once this flushes through, then we'll
switch over to just regular water.
So it's really only two cups of vinegar that
we're going to flush through the system.
And once we turn that on and that starts,
I'm going to spin the rest of these dishes
with the non-scratch scrub sponge and they've
been soaking for a few minutes now.
And I'm going to use the oxo cleaning brush
to get all the little nooks and crannies of that.
Then we'll rinse out our bowl and put that
in the dish drainer and then we'll just monitor
the progress of the flushing of the system.
Now the cool part about what we're doing right
now is because we're just flushing the system
out and we're going to be using three or four
gallons of water.
This allows you in the kitchen to go do other
things.
So you can clean other parts of the kitchen
or rotate laundry or work on other parts of
the house and just check back in periodically
and dump out the old water and then start
the coffee maker again and let the next cycle
go.
So, this is a very easy, easy process from
beginning to end.
The whole entire cleaning of the Keurig machine
takes four to five minutes, but the, the thing
that really takes the longest part of it is
to flush the water and you just kind of have
to keep your eye on that.
All right, once you have flushed the entire
system and you've gone through three or four
gallons to make sure that you've got all the
traces of vinegar and minerals out, then we're
going to go ahead and return the Keurig machine
back to the bar where it came from, with all
of its little fancy coffees and teas and hot
chocolates and all of those things.
So, you put it back where you found it and
now, you're ready to rock and roll and you're
good to go for another couple of months.
And that my friends is how you clean a Keurig
coffee machine.
It was easy, right?
And it was fun and it was quick.
All right, I hope this helps you a little
bit.
If it does, please pass it on to a friend.
If you like, you can come back every couple
of months as you're ready to do this again
and rewatch the video over and remind yourself
how to do it.
Until we meet again, please
leave the world
a cleaner place than when you found it.
