Kitchen cleaning query. Please help!

[Seshat]

My mother used to handle concentrated hydrochloric acid at her job. Caustic soda? Pffft. Easy.

Me? Hell, I'll only handle hot sugar on my good days. No way I'll voluntarily handle caustic soda on ANY day. And conc HCl? NEVER, if I can help it.

[RecoveringKinkoid]

I know you can use a pumice stone (the kind you use on your feet) on porcelain, but I don't know if it will damage ceramic. I don't THINK it will, but you might want to do a little research first. I would definitely test a small area first to make sure it doesn't scratch.

Now, if it turns out to be safe, what I'd do is soak the stain with vinegar, leave it at least twenty minutes, and then scrub the stain off with the pumice stone. That's how I'd scrub mineral stain off a toilet or porcelain sink.

Also, fireplace ash is the scrubbiest stuff on the planet, but again, it's SO abrasive it might scratch ceramic. I use it to clean the tempered glass window of the firebox in my fireplace and it's so abrasive that a paste made of plain fireplace ash and water on an old towel cleans with very little elbow grease. So again, that might work on a stubborn ceramic stain but I would seriously test that theory before wiping the whole thing down with it.

[Seraph]

What about Barkeeper's Friend? Has that been mentioned yet?

And no, I don't mean more booze, I mean the actual cleaning product.

Edit: herpus derpus. FIRST DARNED POST. Please don't skillet me, Lupo.

[Seshat]

Also, fireplace ash is the scrubbiest stuff on the planet, but again, it's SO abrasive it might scratch ceramic.

Speaking of abrasives: toothpaste.

I'm not kidding. I use it to clean my jewelry. It's a gentle abrasive.

If you can't steam/soak/dissolve the crud off, scrub it with the harsher abrasives, and once you're down to 'almost perfect', switch to salt or carb soda, and if you like, a final polish with toothpaste.

You can use a bleaching toothpaste to make it whiter. (Oh, and you can leave a bleaching toothpaste on stuff for longer than you can in your mouth.)

[Der Cute]

I used this for the bathroom tiles and tub
http://www.amazon.com/EarthStone-Bat.../dp/B0039OQ89Q

and it's brother the kitchen stone.
I bought mine at Fred Meyeres (grocery store) and it worked like crazy. Keep it wet, it scrubs the shit off, it's recycled glass and you just wipe it up.

[fireheart]

Distilled white vinegar with steaming hot water cleans and disinfects just about anything.

When I feel I need an even heavier clean, I use Pine Sol. On like, everything. And Clorox Wipes.

For some reason, taking three or four Clorox Wipes and wiping them across the floor cleans it better than sweeping and mopping.

Just as long as Lupo isn't taking the canister, flapping the lid up and down as if it was speaking while singing "Mama's got the magic of Clorox!"