A few weeks ago, I shared a post about finding old incomplete dish sets around the house. I did find a few!
One small group of bowls I found were from a company called Pfaltzgraff. I had a complete set of these stoneware dishes in the 1980s. However, the only remnants left in my house were three serving bowls and a sugar bowl. For the old post, SEE Pfaltzgraff blog.
The original company sold but they still make a lot of the old patterns and new ones in their stoneware. SEE Pfaltzgraffstore. I had a pattern called “grapevine,” white background with light green vines and blue, purple grapes. My home color palette has always been a combination of light green, blues, and white.
When I looked at the bowls, I remembered why I didn’t keep those dishes. The marks! Flatware use results in unsightly gray marks on these dishes from a deposit of silver or aluminum in the spoons, knives, etc. The dishes just look dirty.
I thought I would try and clean them up. I went online and found multiple suggestions for Mr. Clean’s eraser pad.
Sadly, That did lighten it up but did not remove the marks at all. You can see the metal coming off on the pad, but a lot stayed on the bowl.
Next, I thought I’d try creamy Barkeepers Friend with the magic eraser. A good improvement, but I still had a few light gray marks.
Now mind, I haven’t cleaned these dishes since I put them away sometime in the 1990s.
I decided to try making a past of the Barkeepers Friend powder cleanser with the liquid, which worked just great.
The bowls now look like new: except the one with the crack. I won’t use that bowl, but I’ll save it for forcing spring bulbs this winter: a layer of stone and then the bulbs.
I like the look of the bowls and the pattern, so that I will keep them. You can never have too many serving bowls of various sizes. Right? But because I know the flatware will cause the gray marks again, I will use the bowls with serving ware spoons made from plastic or wood.
So, in conclusion, I again recommend BarKeepers Friend. It works great. Works my stainless steel pans to clean and to remove watermarks too!
Do any of you have dishes that mark like this? Try the Barkeepers combo, and let me know how it does in cleaning stains your dishes.
Dara
