Wednesday, December 31, 2014

Cleaning Butcher Block with Lemon - Fail

Back in May my hubby and I renovated our kitchen. Well, our contractor did. And we went from this...


To THIS!



I'm STILL in love :D

But I'm learning some hard lessons about our lovely butcher block island counter. Like STAINS! EWW
I'm very diligent when using my island. Mostly dry ingredients, any wet spills are wiped up right away, and I clean it off regularly. My husband and mother in law - not so much. It's almost at the point where I need to sand down some parts and re-oil them to remove the stains. But that's what happens when you use butcher block.

I found some ideas for regular spot cleaning, one using coarse salt and half a lemon. I picked a spot on my counter to experiment on, a small-ish, relatively fresh stain.

As instructed I put on the salt, scrubbed with the lemon. No effect. I left the mixture on to set for a while. No effect.
I tried again with MORE salt and lemon.

Nope, still there. It's slightly faded, but there. 


Before
After (with new stains added)



















Boo
I had high hopes that this would work. Even though it faded the stain, I have used it on other more damaged spots with zero effect. I will most likely have to sand or bleach my butcher block to remove the stains and start over again.


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