No-Nonsense Holiday Stain Removal

With all the feasting at this time of the year, there are bound to be spills.  Did you know linen is one of the easiest fabrics to keep clean, if not the easiest?

The proof is in the pudding…so we have staged a demonstration.

We added gravy, cranberry, red wine and chocolate, all to one hapless white linen napkin. 

We rinsed the worst of it off, rubbed dish detergent into the gravy and chocolate to get rid of the grease, soaked it overnight in Biz and absentmindedly drank the wine.  In the morning, we washed it as usual in the machine, but we didn’t put it in the dryer.  Why not? Because heat can set a stain, even on stain-resistant linen. 

HOW TO TREAT STAINS
1) Rinse under water
2) Rub dish detergent into the greasy spots 
3) Soak overnight in well-dissolved Biz (never chlorine bleach)
4) Launder as usual in your machine, but DON'T dry until you've checked all stains are gone

While the napkin was drying, we did still see a shadow of red wine, so we dunked it again in Biz and voila, perfection!  Linen is so easy to clean!

Wax can be a problem too, but since linen is a bast fibre (from the flax stem), it even shrugs off wax better than cotton.  Do all the things Martha tells us - scrape it off cold, etc. etc.. but I find the old-fashioned method of ironing it between sheets of brown paper (keep the paper moving) works.  It can be difficult to locate brown paper now, so if you have any scraps of sacrificial cotton, use them.

Happy, carefree holidays!