That’s right. I’ve boiled water down to nothing in my favorite soup pot. I scrubbed off most of the black, is there any way I can save it? I’ve done it (once)before, so I must have saved it that time…
Or feel free to come in and mock me for burning water.
Try avoiding burning water in it. No seriously, I’ve had luck gently boiling water in a pot with stuff burnt on the bottom, letting it cool down and scrubbing at it, then repeating the process.
Amateur. My wife left the cast aluminum milk steamer on a burner and walked away from it. Know what happens to aluminum when the water boils off? It catches fire. By the time I got to it, it was a flaming slag heap on the stove top. And the smell was lovely!
I’ve saved such pots before with a mixture of baking soda, coca cola and a little bit of water. I just sprinkle the baking soda on the inside, enough Coke to cover the burned surfaces and, well, I don’t know why I added the water, but it was only like a tablespoon or so. Leave to simmer very, very gently, scraping with a metal spoon or spatula every so often to work free the bits as they get loosened. One particularly bad mess was a pot of potatoes I had forgotten that I was boiling. I probably had to do the baking soda/coke treatment four or five times before it was finally to the point that I could just whip out the brillo pad and scour the rest off.
S.O.S. soap pads. Those suckers are awesome! Just don’t use them on Teflon®. If your pot was non-stick, you are going to need to toss it. Any scouring will cause the coating to flake off into your food, where it may or may not cause cancer.
I burnt water once. I was living on my own in California, and I went to make some ramen noodles (mmm, poor food) and forgot I had the pot on the stove. I threw it away.