Prevent a disaster at Thanksgiving.

It is a common practice just before a Holiday or a party that the cook decides to self-clean the oven or range.  I can understand that making everything look good is important, but there is a definite relationship between self-cleaning the oven and oven failure shortly after.

Think about this for a moment.  The oven self-clean process is an extreme high temperature function that basically burns the food residue off of the surface inside the oven.  Temperatures can reach 700-900 degrees during the 2-4 hour cycle time.  Depending on the age and how often you use your oven, the elements or ignitor could weaken and eventually fail the next time you plan to use the oven.  This is never a good thing when you have 30 people coming for Thanksgiving dinner or need to bake cookies or pies for the holiday.

So, before you get too close to the big event, plan your cleaning process leaving enough time for the appliance repairman to fix the oven, or better, wait until after the event to clean up.  Happy Holidays.