Blackening stove hobs

Some while ago in the kitchen cleaning post I complained about the stains on the hobs. The hobs stay stained even though those had been cleaned many times.

Nina from No. 40 commented on that post that she had used a blackening paste to refresh the hobs on her grandmother's kitchen. I had never seen that type of paste and I assumed that it is not sold anymore or it has never been sold in Finland. But a friend of mine, lets call her Anne, read the comment and told me she has seen it. Anne said that I should check from Tarjoustalo if they would have it. And they did. The paste was there right beside the oven and stove cleaning products, just like Anne predicted.

Freely translated the product is called 'stove black'. It did not really have much instructions on how to apply it. It just said that it should be applied with a rag and hands should be protected with rubber cloves. It also stated that heat should be applied. Nina said that the paste had to be put on while the hobs were hot, but since the jar didn't say anything about when the heat should be applied I decided to put the paste on cold hob and then heat it. I thought that would be just easier.

The paste smeared the white areas on the stove easily but it was easy to clean those again with a rag and dish washing liquid. Once I had applied the paste I put all hobs on full heat and waited. The paste smoked for a while and it did not smell that nice. Luckily I had realized to put the hood on full speed. The hobs smoked for a while but stopped after couple ten seconds later (EDIT. Please check the Postscript).

I do think the hobs look so much better now, that paste really did cover up the stubborn stains. Although I don't think the hobs actually are black, I think the paste made them almost silvery. But that's fine. Silver is good. Thank you Nina and Anne on your excellent advice!

PS. I noticed some people have found to my blog using search words like 'blackening stove' and similar. I've been meaning to do a sequel for this post, since the blackening wasn't as easy as I imply here. I thought the blackening paste was stuck to the stove hobs, but later when I wiped the stove I noticed the paste wipes away. I read from the web that the hobs need to be heated very very hot in order for the paste to stick. I haven't tried it yet. I will do another post from that when I have time.