After Thanksgiving, you might want nothing more than to relax and digest the excess food you ate the day before or burn off some calories while enjoying the warm fall weather in Ventura, CA. However, many homeowners need to deal with a kitchen drain that’s clogged because of its own excessive food intake.
The day after Turkey Day is often a plumber’s most-booked day of the year. Fortunately, you can stay off your plumber’s list by following these tips to keep your drain clog-free this Thanksgiving.
Keep Turkey Grease, Skin, and Other Fats Out
Never pour turkey grease or fat drippings down the sink in your Ventura, CA home. Even when oils are liquid at room temperature, they can still contribute to clogs.
Any fats that harden at room temperature will congeal in your sink’s pipes, sticking to the walls and narrowing the pipes. This process causes clogging in the same way that plaque clogs your arteries.
Some people run hot water to melt grease down the drain, but it solidifies further down once it cools. Hot water can cause all the fat to liquefy, collect, and harden into a large, solid, pipe-clogging layer of goop.
Turkey Bones Belong in the Trash
Turkey, chicken, and other bones are bad news for your kitchen sink drain. It’s easy to see how the large ones cause problems, but even small bones can get caught lower down in the drain pipe. Once this happens, other foods and scraps get caught on the way down, narrowing your drain pipe until it becomes completely clogged and needs drain cleaning.
You might think putting bones down a drain in your home is okay if you have a garbage disposal. Unfortunately, garbage disposal blades were not built to handle the dense, hard bones, and the bone fragments could chip the blades or block them from turning.
Veggie Peels and Stalks Are a No-No
When you peel a pile of potatoes for Thanksgiving dinner, put those peels in the trash, not in your sink. The peels stick together, creating a slimy, soggy mess down the drain, which forms a clog. The peels can also become stuck under and around garbage disposal blades. Then your sink will be totally out of commission, just in time for Thanksgiving dinner clean-up.
The same goes for fibrous veggies. Vegetable waste like artichoke leaves, asparagus stems, celery, onion skin, and squash can create dense, nasty drain clogs. Their stringy nature contributes to their ability to wrap around other food waste or the base of your garbage disposal blades.
Rice & Pasta Go in the Garbage
Starchy foods like pasta, rice, and mashed potatoes absorb and hold water while cooking. However, when these items go down your drain, they absorb even more water and swell in size until your drain is completely blocked.
We’re Here for You!
If you must put food scraps down your kitchen drain, feed them in a small amount at a time, using plenty of water to wash them down. A big contributor to Thanksgiving drain clogs is a large amount of food waste that goes down the drain all at once.
If your drain becomes clogged, you can rely on the professional plumbers at Advanced Plumbing & Leak Detection. We have decades of experience and cutting-edge clog-detecting technology to get your pipes moving again, fast. Get your drains unclogged with a 100% satisfaction guarantee by calling us today!
