oldies but goodies

There are lots of modern devices that make life a lot easier - particularly on the domestic front. But sometimes there are products that, while they may not be hip and cool, do what they promise to do and have yet to be bettered at doing it. I was reminded of this when doing some cleaning this weekend. We will be renting out our flat soon and so there are lots of jobs to be done including shining up all the chrome in the kitchen. Of course, it all gets a clean regularly like the rest of the kitchen but every so often you need to go a bit further than that to get a really good deep clean and sparkling shine. I also had a lot of kitchen equipment that will need to go into storage and wanted to give everything a really good scrub - my thinking being if it goes in super clean then it won't be so much hard work to deal with when we unpack it eventually.

The thing is, while I use things like Flash cleaning fluid etc, they just don't hit the spot when I want to really scrub, buff and shine. When I want to go all for broke I break out 'the pink stuff' which a is a grainy pink paste my Mum introduced me to. Maybe you all have gleaming pots that sparkle and blind you in the sun - me, I have clean pots but every so often like to scrub the bottom of them to return them to shop bought brilliance and I admit to not carrying out this task every time a I use them. The pink stuff is amazing for this, shines up your sink and draining board and is very good at things like cutting through the grease build up you sometimes get on cooker hoods and suchlike.

Today, though, it isn't easy to get a hold of the pink stuff. Old fashioned ironmongers stock it but with ironmongers themselves becoming scarce I was worried about my supply. So I turned to the always reliable internet and found a website that stocks the pink stuff plus a variety of old fashioned domestic products. It is called the Carbolic Soap Company.

They do all sorts of old fashioned bits and pieces including 'lifebuoy soap' which my gran used to talk about - and often threaten us with a good scrubbing with - when we were little.

So I have ordered a good supply of pink stuff and will be browsing their website for other older, but still the best, items for keeping everything ship shape!