6 Surprising Spots in Your Kitchen That You Can (and Should!) Vacuum

Shifrah Combiths
Shifrah Combiths
With five children, Shifrah is learning a thing or two about how to keep a fairly organized and pretty clean house with a grateful heart in a way that leaves plenty of time for the people who matter most. Shifrah grew up in San Francisco, but has come to appreciate smaller town…read more
updated Jan 28, 2021
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Someone vacuuming a kitchen rug.
Credit: Sarah Crowley

I haven’t done an official poll or anything, but on the list of least hated chores, I’d venture to say that vacuuming ranks high. It’s decently fun (as far as chores go!) and it gives you instant gratification. (One second, schmutz is there; the next it’s gone!) So why not harness the power of your vacuum in other ways? Turns out, vacuuming can be a quick (and ridiculously satisfying) way to clean some surprising places in the kitchen. You know, aside from the floors.

Here are six surprising spots in the kitchen that we all can (and should!) be vacuuming.

1. Inside the stove 

Cleaning crumbs and debris from the oven is annoying. Using a wet rag is a crunchy and not very effective method, and trying to clean the baked-on stuff without getting out the loose pieces first just makes a big, sludgy mess. Instead, take the racks out of your oven, put the nozzle attachment on your vacuum cleaner, and vacuum out the crumbs as your first oven-cleaning step. Then, after you scrape off burned-on food, you can go in with another round of vacuuming to get those now-loose pieces out too.

2. Under the stove

Did you know that the drawer under your oven comes all the way out? If you didn’t, it’s likely that there are a LOT of crumbs under there. That’s probably the case, still, even if you did! Pull the drawer out and use the vacuum cleaner to get rid of them in seconds. 

3. On top of the stove

The first step for cleaning the top of a stove is a lot like cleaning inside it: picking up all the random crumbs and bits of food. One of our writers says she vacuums her stovetop before she cleans it and I’m just mad that I hadn’t thought of that sooner.

4. Inside the fridge

It’s amazing how much loose debris gets left behind in the fridge, especially in the produce drawers. Our produce drawers are hard to get out, and using a wet rag to clean out the dried leaves and stems and stuff that ends up at the bottom of the drawer doesn’t feel particularly swift or painless. The vacuum cleaner comes to the rescue again.

Use the brush attachment or the nozzle. You can clean it before sticking it in your fridge if that makes you feel better. Or, you can just vacuum up the loose stuff, knowing that you’re going to be wiping everything down afterwards anyway. Vacuum your drawers, but also the shelves once you’ve emptied them, to eliminate chasing crumbs with a wet rag from your fridge-cleaning checklist for good. 

5. Refrigerator coils and condensers

Not all refrigerators have coils on the back, but they all have a condenser that gets dusty and needs to be cleaned. Dusty condensers affect the function of your fridge, making the unit work harder to keep your food cool and increasing wear and tear. To clean your refrigerator coils, pull the unit away from the wall and locate the condenser. You may have to remove a toe-kick panel on the bottom behind your fridge. Use the brush attachment, which will help dislodge clinging dust, to get rid of all the dust and grime. 

6. Inside drawers and cabinets

No matter what you do, crumbs always have a way of finding their way into your drawers and cabinet shelves. Use the vacuum to suck them out once in a while. Note: You might want to empty your drawers first, if you have lots of little things in there.

Do you vacuum anything else in your kitchen? Tell us in the comments below.