My experience was that I had granite at my previous house. It was brushed granite, not shiny. A red sharpie made a small mark we were never able to remove. After 15 years of use, the section immediately around to the sink faucet began to split and crumble.
My sister put a hot pot on her granite and it cracked. Sample of 2, so not defining for all, of course.
After my experience with the granite deteriorating around the faucet, I take extra care to wipe up water from around the faucet. We currently have quartzite counters (natural stone, different from quartz.)
I must have been very lucky in my old house with Ubatuba granite. I did not baby it, I put hot pots on it and cut on it. I did not use ammonia and I was quick to wipe up acidic spills like lemon juice, and it looked brand new for 20 years.
We are about to install quartz in the master bath. I am not too worried since that gets much less use than a kitchen.
I am curious what the resident chemist(s) think about this product for disinfecting. Looking at the ingredients it is citric acid and is safe for food surfaces. Would this do the job cleaning up raw chicken juice??
Here is the MSDS for the product. Says it has citric acid as the active ingredient. IMO, not bad at all. Just don’t get it in the eyes and don’t breathe it, and it should be fine.
I don’t think there’s any health/safety/damage risk to the citric acid (even HCl had no effect on my sealed granite sample in the lab). But I’m not sure it will adequately address the raw chicken hazard. If anyone in your family has a really keen nose, you could do a test, leaving two samples (1) untreated counter with small amount of chicken juice; (2) counter cleaned with your new product after the chicken juice; (3) counter cleaned with bleach (and rinsed) after the chicken juice. After 24 hours the smells should be unmistakable and you’ll know whether (2) matches your positive or negative control.
ETA you only need a “really keen” nose if you check too early LOL
Nothing beats soap and hot water when it comes to washing raw chicken traces off the kitchen surfaces. We don’t wash dishes with bleach, yet we don’t get sick from our Dawn-washed dishes. Ditto countertops.
Personally, I’d avoid spraying my kitchen with citric acid. It is not volatile, so multiple sprays would leave the powder behind.
Fun fact: citric acid is used to combat invasive coqui in Hawaii. It is the only approved agent to spray the plants where they breed, apparently.
This is how I feel too. I have never put anything on our granite countertops besides soap and water. I think the countertops have had a sealant applied, but I haven’t done it since they were installed.
Years ago my son did a science experiment where they got their hands dirty and then washed them with hot water, regular dishsoap and soap with a disinfectant. Then they placed their hands on a petri dish and compared to the dirty hands. The just hot water hands got rid of 90% of the bacterial growth, regular dish soap got rid of all of it, the disinfectant soap just cost more. I was my counters with a soapy sponge. (They are soapstone so don’t have a sealer.)