Ashley Abramson is a writer-mom hybrid in Minneapolis, MN. Her work, mostly focused on health, psychology, and parenting, has been featured in the Washington Post, New York Times, Allure, and more. She lives in the Minneapolis suburbs with her husband and two young sons.
published Feb 20, 2022
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I love my white kitchen cabinets. What I don’t love is that they tend to easily highlight messes. Greasy fingerprints, dust, food splatter, you name it — it’s almost always visible. I’ve always used a wet microfiber cloth for daily wipe-downs, and maybe an all-purpose cleaner for the tougher gunk. Try as I might, though, the cabinet doors never really look super clean. Thankfully, one of my favorite TikTok follows just introduced me to the perfect solution.
I’ve used Pledge products before on my furniture, but I had no idea the brand, which has been around since 1958, made a multisurface cleaner until the Texas-based pro cleaner Vanesa Amaro posted about it. In her recent video, she uses the Everyday Cleaner spray to clean up dusty black cabinets. While Vanesa was busy pointing out that black cabinets are hard to clean, I was too busy being impressed.
After dusting the drawer and cabinet faces, Amaro sprays a few spritzes of the Pledge Everyday Cleaner on a plush Scrub Daddy microfiber cloth, then proceeds to wipe down every nook and cranny of the cabinets. They looked so clean and shiny afterward, which is hard to accomplish on black cabinets. My kitchen is white, but given my cabinets are an ongoing problem area, I decided I had to try out the spray to see for myself how it worked.
Like other Pledge sprays I’ve used before, this one is designed to remove dust, dirt, and smudges without the pesky streaks some all-purpose cleaners leave behind on surfaces. Plus, it also leaves behind a shine that shows off the natural beauty of whatever you’re cleaning. It’s super versatile: According to the product label, you can use it on almost anything, including wood and wood laminate, granite, and stainless steel. Because it’s not in an aerosol can, it’s better for the environment (and, in my opinion, easier to spray).
I tried it on my fingerprint-ridden cabinets. It’s hard to tell in the photos, but the area around the door handles was covered in greasy fingerprints, which I always have a hard time removing. Like Amaro, I sprayed a couple of spritzes of the cleaner directly on my cloth, then wiped the cabinets down. Right away, I realized I had used too much — I’d say one spray would be more than sufficient, because the liquid has a different, almost thicker consistency than your average all-purpose cleaner. (That’s a good thing, though, because you’ll get more out of the product.)
I wasn’t surprised that the spray did exactly what it said it would (and exactly what Amaro demonstrated in her TikTok). In just a few seconds, the cabinets to my dishes and spices — my two dirtiest doors — were looking brand-new. And my kitchen smelled amazing! The spray has a subtle citrus smell, which I always prefer to floral scents because it smells like a real kitchen.
I can’t wait to try this stuff out on my new dining room table, which is bound to be just as smudgy as my kitchen cabinets.
What do you use to clean your kitchen cabinets? Tell us in the comments below.
