Cleaning Silver-Plated Coffee Pots

If you are looking for an inexpensive, yet elegant alternative to expensive solid silver coffee or tea pots, then a good choice would be to use ones that have been silver-plated. Going off of looks alone, there is little difference between a silver-plated coffee pot and a solid silver one. However, there is a slight difference between how you clean solid silver coffee pots, and silver-plated coffee pots. Cleaning silver-plated coffee pots is pretty easy to do, if you only follow these simple guidelines.

• Exterior. When cleaning silver-plated coffee pots, perhaps the single easiest part to clean is the exterior. The reason for this is that you can clean the silver-plating the same way that you clean any kind of silver. While you could use silver polish, and polish it clean the traditional way, there is another method that is a tad quicker. Simply place about 1 tablespoon each of baking soda and salt, a 4 inch piece of aluminum foil, and your silver-plated coffee pot into a larger pot and fill it with water. Boil everything for about three minutes, let it cool down, and then rinse the coffee pot. Dry the silver-plated coffee pot with a soft cloth and you will also remove the baking soda residue at the same time. Your exterior is now clean.
• Stainless steel interior. With silver-plated coffee pots, one of the most commonly used metals for the interior is stainless steel. This type of metal is used because it is durable, and fairly easy to clean. In order to clean the stainless steel interior, all you need to do is use a little bit of TSP. TSP (or Trisodium Phosphate) is a pretty powerful cleaner. Simply put about 1 teaspoon of TSP into the coffee pot, fill it with hot water, and allow it to sit for an hour. After an hour, pour the cleaner out, and rinse out the interior as normal. Be sure that you completely rinse out the interior to make sure that you get everything out like you want to.
• Aluminum interior. Cleaning the aluminum interior of a silver-plated coffee pot is a little different. For this you will need to get some cream of tartar and water to make a paste. After making the paste, smear it around on the inside of the coffee pot, making sure that you get everything. Allow it to sit and dry for an hour, and then wash off as normal. Do not use TSP on aluminum, or it will turn black.