The Medicine Staple That Makes Cleaning Your Coffee Maker Simple

Is your morning cup of joe tasting a bit funky lately? It could be that your coffee maker needs a clean-out. Over time, limescale builds up from minerals in the tap water you run through your machine, and this whitish buildup will eventually affect the taste of coffee and even the operation of your machine. It can clog tubes, valves, and filters and can even affect how well and consistently your coffee machine heats water. Periodic cleaning of your coffee maker is needed to keep it functioning properly. The good news is, descaling your machine can be a simple task using something that might be sitting in your medicine cabinet right now: Alka-Seltzer.

Alka-Seltzer is known for its use in a variety of cleaning hacks around the home, from degreasing a frying pan to unclogging a drain. The main ingredients of Alka-Seltzer are citric acid and sodium bicarbonate, which is also known as baking soda. When these small tablets hit water, the components have a chemical reaction that releases carbon dioxide gas bubbles. As a medicine, this plop-plop-fizz-fizz action helps settle your stomach. As a cleaning tool, the Alka-Seltzer combo of citric acid and sodium bicarbonate works in two ways. The fizz created when the tablets hit your water reservoir helps dislodge buildup there, and the citric acid in the medicine will break down minerals that form limescale throughout your machine.

Using Alka-Seltzer to clean a drip coffee maker is easy. Simply fill your water chamber, drop in some tablets, and let them dissolve before running a brew cycle. For a 10 oz water reservoir, three or four tablets should do the trick. You'll know it is working when you see sediment appear in your carafe after that first brew cycle. Run two or three additional full tank cycles of plain water through your machine to ensure that all the limescale and residue from the tablets is cleared out. 

If you have hard water with a lot of minerals (more likely if you have a well), you may have thicker limescale buildup that may require using straight citric acid powder or a more powerful descaler made specifically for coffee machines. And while using Alka-Seltzer works well in single-cup makers or traditional drip machines using regular tap water, it may be less effective for cleaning high-end espresso makers. While the citric acid in Alka-Seltzer will help break up limescale in these machines, higher-end machines may have many tubes and valves and complicated parts that may need additional attention to get them fully clean. But for simple machines with a normal amount of buildup, using Alka-Seltzer every month or so will help keep your coffee flowing and tasting great.