November is here. All the Halloween candy has been eaten, the weather is getting colder by the day and the 2013 holiday season is now in full swing. So, along with all the holiday shopping, party planning, and decorating that has to be done before the winter holidays actually arrive, many homeowners who will be hosting dinners and parties in their kitchens are now thinking about how they’re going to prep, cook, and serve all those delectable dishes without dirtying up every surface in their kitchen repeatedly. Fortunately, for those who have granite countertops in their kitchens, a granite cleaner will help keep their countertops sparkling this holiday season.
Although they are durable as stone, and perfect as a building material in the kitchen, granite countertops often take a beating over the course of the holidays. Due to their smooth, sturdy nature, granite countertops make a solid base for preparing large holiday meals. With most granite countertops, you can place hot pans direct from the stove top onto their surfaces without chipping or cracking (although we always recommend using a trivet). This makes a granite countertop a perfect surface for you to whisk up steaming-hot pots of delicious soup, stew, fondue, gravy, sauce, or stock. And if you’re prepping for a big pot of stock or soup or stew, you can even chop vegetables on your granite surfaces without much worry for hurting the surface (although your good knives will dull pretty quickly against the hard granite surface).
Some home bakers and pastry makers love to use their granite countertops to roll out bread dough, pie crust, puff pastry dough and all kinds of dough for holiday cookies. Your granite countertops are cool and tend to absorb the heat from anything that touches their surfaces, making them ideal for rolling out dough of all kinds. Just make sure that your granite surfaces are clean before you start. And it doesn’t hurt to use a little extra flour for dusting the surface area before you start. This helps prevent the dough from sticking to the surface.
Like to make chocolate candies for the holidays? Your granite countertops are a perfect workspace for cooling and working chocolate after tempering. Most professional chocolatiers use a marble or granite slab to cool and work their chocolate. The cool surface of the stone is perfect for bringing melted chocolate down to the perfect temperature, while the flat, impermeable nature of the granite surface allows the chocolatier to work the chocolate directly on the surface without either staining the granite or adding any unwanted flavors to the final product.
Of course, with all of the wonderful cooking, baking, and candy-making that will be going on during this holiday season, you’ll want to make sure that you have a granite cleaner on-hand to keep your countertops sparkling clean for when your guests arrive. The Rock Doctor granite cleaner gets your counters clean without all the extra scrubbing and frustration of an all-purpose cleaner. After all, the holidays are difficult enough for a busy kitchen. Let the Rock Doctor granite cleaner help you keep everything merry and bright!
This article was brought to you by Rock Doctor, which offers a line of specially-formulated stone cleaner, stone polish, and stone sealer products. Rock Doctor stone care products can be purchased through a number of fine retail stores, including Wal-Mart, Lowe’s Home Improvement, Bed Bath & Beyond, Ace Hardware, Do it Best Hardware, Hy-Vee, and Wegmans.
