While you might be on top of things when it comes to cleaning the outsides of your appliances, the insides need some love, too, including your Keurig. If it’s been a minute since you thought about that, don’t worry. You only need one thing to clean it.
Deep cleaning the inside of your Keurig is also known as descaling. Over time, hard water and minerals build up inside the machine and form limescale which creates a gray residue inside. This buildup won’t hurt you, but it could affect your machine and alter the taste of your coffee. The good news is getting rid of it is easy.
While Keurig sells a descaling solution, if you’ve got some white vinegar on hand, that’ll do the job just as well (and it’s cheaper, too).
To descale and deep clean the inside of your Keurig, fill the water reservoir with vinegar and run brew cycles until none remains. Empty whatever might be left inside the reservoir, and then refill it with water. Run brew cycles until it’s drained. If a vinegar smell or taste lingers, continue filling the container with water and completing brew cycles until it’s gone.
Boom! You’ve descaled your machine.
There’s one more step you can take if need be, and that’s cleaning the pod holder. To do so, unplug your machine, pop the pod holder out, and then twist to separate the funnel from the holder. Insert the tip of a paper clip in the tube at the bottom of the holder, and then rotate to clear away any grounds.
Rinse the pod holder and funnel and let them dry. Use the paper clip to clean any leftover grounds from around the entrance needle. You can use a toothbrush to clean the machine lid, and then pop the pod holder and funnel back inside. That’s it—you’ve got a clean Keurig!
Now that you’re in a deep-cleaning mood, you might want to get the coffee stains out of all those mugs.
