How Do You Do Dishes?

[Termy]

The subject of dishes came up. Not everyone has a dishwasher, we have no room here. Others simply wont have one.

So
I get me a good load of nice soapy sorta hot water. I do all the glass first, then the ceramics, plates etc. Then the plastic. I am special careful rinsing the plastic because it is porous. Pots and pans are last.

So
Does anyone have a better idea ?

T

 

[GinnyPNW]

How Do You Do Dishes? - I don't. I cook. Hubby's job is dishes. (Although, I do wash and/or load the dishwasher, as I use things for cooking. All he needs to do is what we serve from and on.)

This is the first house I've ever lived in that has a dishwasher. We're here almost 10 years now. Kinda spoiled!

 

[Andy M.]

We use a dishwasher for most stuff but set aside hand washables to be addressed once a day. I use a soapy sponge to wash knives, meat thermometer, salad spinner, etc.

 

[bethzaring]

A dishwasher. I remember the day in 1994 when I got my first dishwasher. I was 18 years into handwashing milking equipment; milking pail, bulk handling pail, milk strainer. I run at least one load a day and three loads a day in not uncommon. I cook and bake daily and make many dirty bowls and equipment. A dishwasher is a life saver when canning.

 

[bethzaring]

A dishwasher. I remember the day in 1994 when I got my first dishwasher. I was 18 years into handwashing milking equipment; milking pail, bulk handling pail, milk strainer. I run at least one load a day and three loads a day in not uncommon. I cook and bake daily and make many dirty bowls and equipment. A dishwasher is a life saver when canning.

And for many years after, I would say a prayer every time I unloaded the dishwasher, thank you for another load of dishes I did not have to wash by hand...

 

[blissful]

We're just a small family so I wash dishes by hand, 3 or more times a day. We have a dishwasher, I use it to store canning jars, and to run canning jars during the canning season. It's easier than constantly having boxes of canning jars laying around, cleaning them, going down stairs, or needing them running them up stairs, cleaning them for canning, which we do much of the year. We eat so much out of canning jars. Last time I counted it was averaging at using 14 jars/week to eat. The number we use for canning each week varies depending on canning season.

 

[larry_stewart]

Dishwasher at the end of the day or after a big meal, but if its one of my cooking a million things day, then I cook , hand wash, cook, hand wash.... I try to use the same things over and over as not to fill up the sink so I dont get yelled at when my wife gets home.

 

[Sir_Loin_of_Beef]

I live alone, so I have a habit of saying, "oh, that's not enough dishes yet" until its way too many dirty dishes. Dishes, sliverware, serving utensils and anything else that will fit in one layer gets placed in the plugged left-hand sink, largest size like dinner plates on the bottom, which is then filled with water and five squirts of Dawn from an old Soft Soap pump bottle. Glasses, bottles and Pyrex storage containers get placed in the empty right-hand sink and get washed first, then get placed on a draining mat on the left side of the sink. I actually have a glass washer and a bottle brush to wash glasses and bottles.

I work down according to size, with dinner plates being last. Skinny stuff like plates, trays, cutting boards, racks, etc. go into the drainer on the right side of the sink. Pots & pans get washed last and placed in the drainer if they will fit or upside down in the right hand sink if they won't fit in the drainer (think 11 x 17 Pyrex dish or half sheet pans). I use a dish cloth, not a sponge, but I do have a green Scotchbrite, a blue Scotchbrite, and a chainmail scrubber to take care of any resistance.

 

[pepperhead212]

That sounds sort of like I used to do, Termy. And I remember that dishwashers were so bad back then, that my Dad, whose job it was to load the dishwasher, would wash everything off the dishes, before loading it in! Otherwise, half would still be stuck on it! When I set up my kitchen in '83, I got the first DW on the retail market that would heat the water, for washing - a KA. Before that, we were told to keep our hot water heaters set at 140-145°, so the dishwashers would clean properly, and people were burning themselves doing this!

I wash a lot of the larger things, and knives, as I use them, but most things go in the DW. Some larger things, like bowls, sometimes go in there, when covered with something oily, or something like that. Sometimes I use Barkeeper's Friend to remove some of the inside residue in pans, and sometimes for the burned on residue on the outside, where appropriate.

 

[taxlady]

I really appreciate a good dishwasher, too bad ours is not working.

I wash a lot of stuff under running water, as I finish using it for cooking. Sometimes I forget that I will be using something again in five minutes, until after I wash it. That's only annoying, because I don't like to dry dishes. I want them air dried. Much of this part of dishwashing I do by hand, whether or not I have a functioning dishwasher.

For plates, glasses, cutlery, etc. I tend to wash in running water in summer and in a basin of very hot water in winter. I do them pretty much in the same order as Termy listed. The advantage of doing small batches throughout the day is that the dishes are out of the way sooner. It also means that I have to do less precariously balanced constructions on the dish rack, or as some people put it, "less Jenga".

 

[taxlady]

An example (not mine) of dish rack jenga:

 

[Sir_Loin_of_Beef]

And you just know that you are going to need that scolapasta later today.

 

[Katie H]

Most of the time I let the dishwasher take care of things. However, when it comes to some of my precious knives and some my other cookware, I wash by hand.

 

[cjmmytunes]

It's just my Mom and I, for every day meals we use paper plates and plastic silverware. Cooking utensils, pots and pans get washed after they are used. Sundays I use our "Good" porcelain and silverware. My grandmother did this for as long as I can remember.

 

[GinnyPNW]

An RV salesman once told me, "The dishwasher is a good place to put dirty dishes." I agree with him! It is shocking how much water we use hand washing versus the dishwasher. Not that there's a water shortage in most of the PNW, but still, saving water is a good thing! That's my story and I'm sticking to it! ;-)

 

[Vinylhanger]

We have a dishwasher, but I handwash a lot if stuff. I'm a sponge in hand, soap on plate/pan and scrub.

Paper towl to dry, or shake it real good. That's what waterproof floors are for, right?

 

[dragnlaw]

When alone I wash dishes when I can't find anything anymore, and then it's triple jenga.

When family is home, if I haven't done the cooking then I do the washing up. Dishwasher is filled and only turned on when bursting at the seams. Knives, etc. by hand.

I do NOT run water constantly while washing, only turn on to rinse as I go along. My children leave water running constantly which I completely fail to understand as water is metered here. I rarely did that even on the farm with my own unlimited well water!

I do like to hand dry glass - don't like to see water spots. Also don't like water spots on the pots and pans but .... sometimes life gets in the way..

 

[taxlady]

I admit that I do hand dry crystal glasses sometimes. But, usually I can manage for the glasses to dry with only a few or no water spots. I make sure that all the glasses are leaning in the dish rack. That way, all the water tends to run to just one spot and that's where there might be a water spot. I think it's partly because the water on the bottom of the glass, which is the top while drying, slides along the slanted surface towards the bottom, rather than having to drip off of a horizontal surface.

 

[dragnlaw]

Wow, you must have very soft water!

 

[taxlady]

Wow, you must have very soft water!

It might be "soft", but not very soft. I don't really know. It's the tap water from Pierrefonds. I'm pretty sure they get it out of the Saint Lawrence River. But, if I don't have the glasses tilted when they are drying, they do show some spots. Or, maybe it's just my eyes. I am overdue for a visit to the optometrist.