Would you, could you, put silver forks in the dishwasher?

[cordiality]

I bought the most beautiful canteen of old cutlery from a car boot sale. It was a bargain and I completely love it.

Our current cutlery is rubbish and nothing matches, and I really don't want to keep this stuff for best (which basically would mean never in our house!).

Only prob is, the forks and spoons are silver plated, and the knives are stainless steel with bone handles. .

Please tell me your stories of how you've been dishwashing the family silver for 40 years and it still looks perfect...

Or AIBU?!

No

There is nothing I wouldn't put in a dishwasher. Life is too short to hand wash a pan that might last a bit longer.
I have some ancient silver cutlery from my grandmother mostly about 100 years old. It tarnishes and washing won't remove that but nor does it do any harm.

It's not a good idea for the silver but I have been told if there is no other metal in the machine then it won't tarnish as badly. Let me know if you try that. But the bone handles are a total no in the dishwasher.

I wouldn't.

My 75 year old friend has been putting her wedding cutlery in the dishwasher and while the silver plating hasn't come off and they are still usable they have seriously discoloured.
She doesn't care, as she says I'm 75 years old I'm not standing a the sink to wash a bloody fork when I could be doing something far superior

Iv put my inherited bone (I think) handled butter knife in the dishwasher and the handle has eventually cracked and the texture of it has changed.
Again I'm not bothered.

but you might care if those were the outcomes for you.

No way.

Warning! If the old cutlery has bone handles, they're probably stuck on with that glue made from horse hooves (can't remember what it's called,sorry)
That will dissolve in the heat of the dishwasher.
So,, handwash only to be on the safe side.

So maybe I should hand wash the knives, but the forks and spoons might be ok, if a little tarnished? Will they untarnish if polished occasionally? * (clutching at straws*)

I wouldn't, the dishwasher does damage stuff and not the hard to wash and buff cutlery
We have some matte dark grey colour cutlery which is just coated after a year that has started to look not so great and I blame the dishwasher..
same with some copper handled knives we have..

Hand wash your silver cutlery in VERY hot water with a good quality washing up liquid (eg Method) and a metal sponge and it will hardly tarnish.

I honestly wouldn't and I am very fast and loose re dishwashing things that aren't meant to be.

If you really love them, I wouldn't. I'd buy the cheapest possible set of dish washable cutlery for everyday then use the lovely hand washable ones once a week, e.g. for Sunday roast.

I have some silver cake forks that I sling in the dishwasher. They do tarnish but every so often I give them a scrub with some wire wool or brasso and it comes off easily. Having said that, I only use them occasionally so if they were in daily use they might tarnish much more quickly iyswim.

In my experience the issue with this is not the tarnishing but the silver plate actually coming off. Solid silver has been fine in the dishwasher, but not bone-handled knives as mentioned above.

I suppose you could try a piece on the 30 minute short cycle and see how it goes.

We have silver cutlery (I think Arthur Price) and they say put it in the dishwasher, but not next to anything stainless steel.

However don't know what they say about silver plated, and bone handled are a no.

No! You'll ruin them.

Bone disintegrates (over time) in the dishwasher - know this from experience.

Ok fine! 😩
A lifetime of handwashing for me, and I am fine with it, cos I LUFFS them

Handwash the knives, if you dishwash the rest, only have silver in there. We have silver plated that we use everyday, if they go in the machine I make sure there’s no other cutlery in there, I do mostly handwash tho. As other pp said, the occasional scrub removes tarnish.

The salt will affect the knife blades and wear the plating from the handles and prongs.

We put ours in. Life is way too short to handwash absolutely anything.
Dp washes some of his knives by hand but that’s it. Everything else is washed in it.
I don’t really care about tarnishing. It’s cutlery for eating not looking at (for me at least!).

Some foods will cause silver to tarnish more quickly - eggs in particular, it's the sulphur in them, you get black silver sulphide forming.

Worked in a restaurant with silver cutlery - no eggs! They mark, and we use to 'silver dip' once a month. It took about 5 years (that's restaurant service/turn over in an industrial machine) and the forks started to lose their plating.

My dh used to be a jeweller and used to sell this kind of thing and he says under no circumstances should they go in a dishwasher.

At and old workplace of his a lady bought some sterling silver cutlery with bone handles for her daughter and son-in-law and she didn't tell them they needed washed straight away after use, especially after using for egg, and not to put them in the dishwasher, they didn't read the instructions that came with the cutlery either. They left them to wash until 'later' and used a dishwasher and within a short time they needed repolished. Cost £400. If they were silver plated they would have needed stripped down and replated, a higher cost than repolishing, and we don't know what would have happened to the bone handles during that process.

The silver plated forks and spoons tarnishing will not polish out. With polishing you remove the top layer of metal so more polishing will make them worse. Just use as they are and wash straight away.

Use sliver dip after eggs and rewash afterwards. They will be fine. Handwash silver and bone handled cutlery. Never allow in the dishwasher.