by Christopher Dupee

Created on: June 26, 2009

Scenario: You're sitting at dinner in a nice restaurant with some friends when the unthinkable happens. A droplet of garlic butter from your escargot falls directly onto your shirt leaving it's discolored footprint.

This has happened to most of us at one point in life or another. Normal lines of thought would cause you to go home and wash the stain as soon as possible in hopes of lifting it. The problem there is that it rarely lifts the entire stain, more often it just tints it another color and spreads it out. A very frustrating chain of events. There are untold numbers of tales of ways to remove an oil stain, but few really work.

As most people know treating a stain with hot water, with or without soap, does nothing but set the stain making it impossible to remove. Cold water is the safest bet for any stain, as it doesn't cause the fibers to expand thus enlarging the pores. The most common way of getting oil stains out is to use straight laundry soap directly on the dry article, allowing it so soak directly into the stain. Depending on the soap used this may not be effective. Because oil is base in pH, as are most soaps, it allows the soap to bind to the oil molecules in the stain to allow them to be rinsed away. Unfortunately this is quite time consuming, and if it doesn't work one is tempted to cut the shirt into rags or just throw it in the trash. You could try an acidic substance such as vinegar or lemon, as it may help to make the oil more soluble. Then there is the notoriously toxic compound naphtha that's used in mostly dry-cleaning applications. One may be able to find bars of the compound in some locations. This method is quite effective, but naphtha is a known carcinogen and probably shouldn't be handled any more than absolutely necessary. I would not advise using lighter fluid even though it contains naphtha, as it would probably stain the article on it's own, but it will remove oil spots from concrete, as well as gum and stickers from almost any nonporous surface. The most effective method thus far for getting oil out of clothing is to treat the item with your dish liquid soap of choice (not the dish machine kind), allow it to soak in for up to 2 hours and then wash with an all-natural laundry soap in cold water. Here's a formula commonly used by cooks to removed any strain from their white uniforms:

Treat all stains directly with dish soap.

Pour 1 cup of powdered dish machine soap in your washer

Add cup laundry soap and 1 cup bleach

Wash in cold water

Hopefully one of these methods makes your life just a little easier. Good Luck.

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