To not feel able to cook in my kitchen because it’s dirty

[WoIsMe]

My DH did the kitchen yesterday after dinner and this is what I find when I go to make my own breakfast and my kids’ lunches. I don’t feel that I can prepare food without cleaning up the kitchen first but I have to get my kids to school and get to a meeting at 9 a.m. while my DH has already gone out to work.

So, AIBU for feeling that I can’t cook in this kitchen without having to clean it first?

Dramatic! Just wipe it

Idk maybe the photos don't do it justice as I'm definitely not a clean freak. There were greasy bits of food stuck to the worktops and I'm not going to put the kids' breakfast plates down on a load of cake crumbs from yesterday. The sink was awful with a greasy layer on the base and pieces of food in the plug hole and congealed gravy in the strainer. It wasn't a case of just a few toast crumbs. The hob is pretty irrelevant as the breakfast would be cooked in a pan but it would be a half-arsed job if I wiped down the worktops and table but left the pools of oil on the hob.

What a drama over crumbs and a messy sink. If this is how you react to that, how the hell do you and your DH navigate the big stuff in life?

@Blossomtoes maybe it's the drainage or possibly my DH putting food down it but my sink gets stinky if I use antibac spray rather than bleach.

it would annoy me because to wipe that down (which is all it needs) would require me to fill the sink, put on the rubber gloves etc etc

So I'd be mildly annoyed that it had been left in that state after someone had "cleaned up"

It wouldn't prevent me from making the breakfast/lunch although i do get that some people really may have a problem with it. And probably rather than faffing clearing it up I'd use a chopping board, and then clean it all when i'd finished doing my things. I would remind DH what clearing up really means, and ask him to do it properly next time

Nothing more than a quick wipe. For you, now. Yes, that he should have done.

Your DH is shite at cleaning. But that would take literally 10 seconds to sort. I'd be pissed off that DH did a half arsed job but not stressed at the time impact.

Possibly. Or possibly not based on my own experience. I mean, how hard is it to wipe down some sides? It’s not hard. So why didn’t he do it? It was his job. Why should the OP have to do it this morning? Someone this pissed off over it suggests someone who’s fucking sick of it.

I don’t believe men aren’t able to see rank food in sinks and crumbs all over sides and tables, so why not clean it up properly?

Interesting. I would grab a cloth, run it under the hot tap, and then wipe off the crumbs. With a drop of washing up liquid if greasy.

If my partner cooks dinner, I'm grateful for that. If she cooks dinner and then clears up leaving only a few crumbs for me to wipe away when I get up with the kids in the morning, then even better.

I suspect (though it's not clear from the OP) that you cooked dinner and your DH was supposed to tidy up as his part of the deal, but did a half-arsed job. In that case, he's a bit of a slob and could do with upping his game.

YANBU to feel that you want to give the worktop a quick wipe before using it, or to give the sink a quick rinse out and wipe round. I would do the same - I like to clean as I go along, and to leave things as I would like to find them. It is irksome to have to clean both before AND after cooking.

But all this drama was, perhaps, a little bit OTT, and YABU to suggest that preparing breakfast on a worktop with a few crumbs would actually have harmed anyone.

This is the kind of quality info that MN needs to highlight on their front page IMO.

agree. That's the content i come for (as well as the drama)

Interesting. I would grab a cloth, run it under the hot tap, and then wipe off the crumbs. With a drop of washing up liquid if greasy.

i am fully aware that this is "my" issue - i won't touch a kitchen sponge/cloth without gloves on, let alone wring them out. But that's me. I certainly won't put my hand in a sink full of washing up water without the gloves (because it's either gunky water that someone has left, and they get a talking to, or it is washing up water which is too hot for my, frankly, useless and soft hands)

Thanks for replying, and sorry about your hands! I was worried I was somehow missing a vital step and being slovenly.

It's not that bad - you could wipe those surfaces and clean the sink in two minutes. I wouldn't prep food on a dirty work top but it's not like it needs scrubbing.

It's not clean but if you need to cook just cook it's not covered in mould or anything

Sorry didn't read your update that it actually took 6 minutes! Time is precious in the morning so ideally you wouldn't have to clean but I would probably have left the sink and just done the surfaces.

I think people are missing the point. The OP shouldn’t have to clean up the sides and sink, no matter how quick a job it might be, her husband should have done it last night. But he didn’t. And that’s irritating as fuck.

Blimey, you’re easily irritated,

It might not feature on world's worst hoarders but that isn't food prep clean.

I just can’t believe you timed yourself.

🙄 If it was a one-off, I’d be irked and id leave it for him to sort. If it was consistently a shit job done by a lazy husband (as per my earlier post) then yes, I’d find it irritating as fuck, for there would be a cynical reason as to why he did it.

I would give it a wipe first, but would also address with DP why he'd made such a poor job of cleaning the kitchen.

LTB

I don't know why you'd have to fill an entire sink with hot water? I'd just run the tap till it's hot, wet my sponge under it, use some kitchen spray, get the surfaces clean and then deal with the sink-gunk with the now spanking hot water and a scourer. I also can't cook in a dirty kitchen - it has to be pristine. And I hate sink-gunk.

Not ideal that you had to clean up, obviously. I would have had a moan at my husband if he'd left the sink like that after washing up. I'm not as bothered about crumbs on the side.

You'd have heart failure if you saw my cooker top right now.

You can't feel that strongly about it, or you wouldn't have had time to take photos, upload them on MN, then come back and update us.

Calm down, it's just crumbs.

Yes he should have also wiped up those crumbs and you shouldn't have to. But let's be real here, it would've taken you an additional ten seconds if you didn't want to just put a board over the top and then let him deal with it later. I would have wiped up the crumbs if they were in the position I wanted to start prepping food. Not if they're on the table and not the counter top which it looks like they are, and I would have left the sink.