Well, I was not. I keep thinking there has got to be a way to dissolve the black, caked on oil resins, and so far I haven't found a solvent that works. I tried the relatively harmless stuff found around a household; the more aggressive being the lye solution, brake cleaner, acetone, citric acid, muriatic acid (i.e. HCl but relatively weak). Sibling has a good point to try more heat, which should be easy to try since the object is stainless steel.
I don't know how baked on you're talking here, but we somewhat routinely end up with oily residue that's still in the sticky to moderately hard state.
Baking soda and peroxide cleans that shit off like magic. You should Google the exact procedure and proportions.
Edited to add: a single edge razor scraper is worth a try on stainless. The razor blade is roughly as hard as the substrate, so you won't gouge it too bad. Get the plastic Allway holders. The metal ones are garbage and, incredibly, the generic plastic ones are pretty inferior.
Very :-). I'm talking about a pan accidentally left on the grill or in the oven for too long until it smokes. The residue is pretty much what you end up with when seasoning cast iron cookware, and is very hard and resistant to usual household chemicals. It's far from the oily residue that is removed easily with paint thinner or acetone.
Oven cleaner (Easy-Off heavy duty or similar), in a sealed plastic bag with the item in question, left for 24-48 hours. Rinse thoroughly with tap water, then DI water, then distilled vinegar, then tap water & DI water again. Works to strip cast iron, should work for similar gunk. Obviously wear appropriate PPE (long rubber gloves, follow all warnings on the oven cleaner, work in a well-ventilated area, the MSDS[1] is useful though all instructions should be on the label).
If the cookware is metal you can use electrolysis.
Car battery charger clamped with an electrode to sacrificial metal plate and an electrode to cookware; both hanging apart from each other in a bath of electrolyte made of water + sodium carbonate. Let it work for a day or so in a well ventilated area (it will create hydrogen gas).
Have you tried barkeeper's friend with a nylon scrubbie or steel wool? I've found that to be excellent, if labor-intensive, at returning stainless steel to like-new condition, even when dealing with oily residue that's been baked at 500 degrees.
Gotcha! I don’t mean to dunk on you… sounds like a cool project if you take appropriate safety precautions, but the possibility of accidentally creating some poisonous (or carcinogenic) substances seems pretty high. I’m far from and expert though.
I might have a low risk tolerance, but I would toss any cookware touched by, like, half of the chemicals you listed. Don’t want to find out the hard way that some nasty layer of something is slowly leaching into my food.
If you do move forwards with this, definitely write up your findings... "Removing burnt food with piranha solution without dying" will make a great blog post.
Ammonia vapor works great on burned on grease if the thing you are cleaning isn't damaged by it. Use it for my burner grates and drip pans, just put them in an enclosed container with some ammonia and let sit for a day or two.
