Sir Elton John is getting into the Christmas spirit from the comfort of his £4.2 million Windsor home – and embracing some tongue-in-cheek critique from his fans. The music legend, 78, took to Instagram on 29 November to share a lighthearted video to the tune of his 1974 festive hit 'Step Into Christmas'.
"If you can't escape it, you might as well 'Step Into Christmas!' Who's ready?," Elton captioned the comedic video, which saw him in the kitchen at the home he shares with his husband David Furnish and two children, Zachary, 15, and Elijah, 12, opening every drawer and cupboard to be met with the song playing out.
Elton shows a glimpse inside his oven
Also opened up wide in the video was Elton's oven, which caught the attention of his fans who decided it could do with a spruce up before the festive season due to the appearance of grime inside. "Nice to see even Elton's oven needs cleaning before Christmas, my oven glass needs an oven doctor too," one fan jested, while another joked: "I love his house is normal, and his oven door needs a clean inside." A third added: "His oven is filthy."
© InstagramThe comments, however playful in tone, did not go unnoticed by the 'Rocketman' singer. Elton soon took to Instagram with two videos to clap back. "Hello people, it's Elton John here. A couple of weeks ago, I did some videos in this kitchen about how crazy 'Step Into Christmas' was driving me, and it got an incredible response, which I was quite startled about," he began.
Elton claps back after oven critique
"But a lot of the response was negative about how dirty my oven was, my oven door, my oven window, and I can assure you that I don't have anything dirty in this house, I've never had anything dirty," he added. "I'm not a dirty person, so to prove that I don't have anything dirty, I'm going to do something to show you."
© InstagramThe next video, posted on 7 December, cut to Elton playfully scrubbing his oven door while wearing a pair of pink feathered Marigold gloves. "Look, I've got the cleanest oven door in Windsor!" he said.
How to clean an oven
Ovens certainly get dirty over the festive season as many of us are cooking more than usual for entertaining purposes and are often cooking dishes that involve lots of fat, such as roast potatoes, that can splash the inside of the oven and leave it looking mucky.
You can clean your oven in the lead-up to Christmas, like Elton, so it feels fresh before you start hosting others, or you can do a cleaning blitz in the New Year to start 2026 afresh. Inspired by Elton's unexpected burst of pre-Christmas cleaning energy, here is the ultimate five-step guide to achieving the 'cleanest oven door in Windsor' for your own festive cooking…
- Empty the oven of shelves and keep it turned off.
- Mix 100 grams of baking soda with a few tablespoons of water in a bowl until it forms a paste.
- Coat the oven in the paste while wearing rubber gloves.
- Spray white vinegar onto the paste and scrub using a damp cloth.
- Rinse the cloth and repeat until the paste has been washed away and the oven is sparkling.
Top tip: For extra tough stains, leave the paste on overnight before scrubbing with white vinegar the next day.
Laura Mountford, a cleaning content creator and author, also tells us that a reusable oven liner is an absolute must to catch any spills and grease at the bottom of your oven, and a steamer is fantastic for blasting away the grease.
Inside Elton's Windsor home
The 'Our Song' hitmaker and his husband of 11 years have called their sprawling estate, Woodside, their home for many years. Elton purchased the property for £400,000 in 1974 following the stratospheric success of his album Goodbye Yellow Brick Road.
© InstagramThough he keeps the interior to himself for the most part, the singer has shared the occasional snap of the self-described "kitsch" space. As per the definition of kitsch, the home is full of whimsical antiques, gorgeous artwork in gilded gold frames, and ornamental pieces galore.
Decorating the home has become somewhat of a passion project for the star. "When I came out of rehab 10 years ago, I realised that life is so much more beautiful than my house reflected," he told Architectural Digest in 2000.
© Instagram"I wanted a normal life, a traditional country house, and [interior designers] Andrew Protheroe and Adrian Cooper-Grigg created that for me at Woodside.
"Ever since then, I've always had a decorating project underway, and because I always want to do more, each house is a work in progress. If I weren't a musician, I would love to be a decorator."
