To think dishwasher fans are part of a cult

[Peachpicklepie]

I look at people who like dishwashers the same way as I might someone who lives isolated from society, wearing a tin foil hat, while hanging on the every word of madman - with a mix of confusion and pity. Why do people like them? You still have to scrape the waste food off, rinse the plate, then put it in the rack. With hand washing this is where it ends. With a dishwasher you then have to put up with the horrible wafts of smell that come out every time you add a utensil until you finally have a full load/have run out of everything when you can turn it on. Then you have to unload the bastard. Don't get me started on the slops of cold or hot water you get from upside down mugs. So what is the appeal?!

No-one is expected to do laundry by hand any more, so why do some people see use of a dishwasher as a pointless novelty rather than a very useful labour saving device, about which they make up all sorts of untruths, as an apparent justification not to use one. Very strange.

Are you my mother in law?

i dont know why ANYONE finds putting their hands in dirty water appealing to wash dishes, nor do i think its right to wash under running water because its a waste.

Why would i want to stand at the sink, staring at a great pile of dishes and pots and pans and cutlery after cooking when i can just dish up and dump them straight in the dish washer? Ours goes on every night at bedtime.

I also dont have to dry anything up, which i loathe, just put it all away.

People who insist on handwashing when there are dishwashers are weird and clearly have too much time on their hands.

YABU and doing it wrong OP.
I scrape and just stick the dishes in the dishwasher, they are cleaner and it's more hygienic and uses less water overall that hand washing dishes. I've being using one for over 30 years, Barr a year when we moved and it nearly caused divorce.

@Peachpicklepie I bet you still have a twin tub and a mangle, cook over an open fire and watch black & white tv.

Sorry OP I echo everyone else. I went through a period of not having one then when. I got given one it was life changing and now you would need to prise it from my cold dead hands. I don’t pre rinse or anything either, scrape food off and put in dishwasher, use decent tablets and everything comes out clean and dry

You pre rinse everything? Seems like a total waste of water. I do scrape bits of food off but only because getting it out of the filter is annoying.
DH has occasionally got a bit fanny pants about certain things going in like a carving knife or a particular pan so my attitude is that if he uses said item, then he washes it up. He's learned that if it's left on the side then it'll end up in the dishwasher.
I will decide not to buy something kitchen related if it's not dishwasher safe. Life is too full of other faffs to hand wash stuff.

OP, I love my dishwasher as it saves me a lot of time.

a) we don't have food waste on our plates, we scoff everything
b) there is no need to rinse
c) the dishwasher never smells as we load it and put it on
d) if you get slops of water on stuff, you are either loading wrongly or your dishwasher isn't working properly, or is a shit one

@F1ymetothetoon A television? I think it's more likely that the op only has a wireless powered by a hamster in a wheel.

You’re not supposed to rinse stuff put in the dishwasher. It rinses it for you before washing it. Obviously you scrape off any lumps left in plates but you’d do that anyway with hand washing.

You’re also supposed to do a maintenance wash in it regularly to get rid of smells and residue.

it takes me 5 mins to clear up after dinner including wiping sides and hob as opposed to going into the kitchen afterwards and seeing tons of stuff to wash up and then having to spend 20+ mins hand washing. I put stuff in the dishwasher I’ve used while cooking so kitchen is always clear and there’s only plates really to put in afterwards.

Also the odd snack plate, cups and glasses used throughout the day can be stacked ready for washing rather than sitting in the sink/counter. You know cutlery has been washed in high temp to get rid of germs.

Saves my hands (and nails) getting dry too.

Whats not to like?

This!

There's been a lot of feckin' weird threads on Mumsnet in the last 24 hours.

I love being able to shove things in there after breakfast before we all leave the house. I don’t have time to wash everything up straight away, let alone dry it and put it away, but with a dishwasher no one has to come home to a sink full of dirty stuff that needs washing before you can do anything else.

People I know who don’t have dishwashers are either permanently attached to the sink, or they have a stack of dirty cups sitting around, or they have a drying rack full of stuff waiting to be put away. I like nice clear sinks and surfaces.

Dishwashers are supposed to be better for the environment than handwashing if you use them effectively. You aren't supposed to rinse before as the detergent won't work as efficiently and is also bad for the environment. I have never smelt horrible wafts coming out of our dishwasher.

OP do you only have one meal's worth of utensils? Why are you putting mugs in upside down? How do you put away more things from the dishwasher than from handwashing?

I like using the dishwasher because it makes life easier.

You're doing it wrong. Why does your dishwasher smell? And you don't need to rinse the plates first.

@MogTheMoogle wrote:
I am bad dishwasher owner and don't really rinse.

No. You're a good dishwasher owner!

You're not supposed to rinse. When ours broke down (it's done so once in the eight years we've had it, so don't seize on this as yet another awful thing about dishwashers, OP!) the repair guy asked if we pre-rinsed things, because he said this would cause issues. Something to do with turbidity sensors and excessive foam if there wasn't enough food residue on the dishes.

us do carry washing down to the river, us wimmin, having plentiful flat rocks, smaller sstones to beat the filth out of our cold washed smocks, wring wring, sing, wring, madrigals, before our maidens lightly parade to our riverbank towing small wooden cart, laden with wooden plates, spoons, wash scrub, sing, before testing their marriagability by washing sects clothes, men and boys squat on the opposite bank, watching, commenting,which maid will wash most dishes the more efficiently, which maid the most comely, home now to black cauldron hanging by its sturdy hook above communal fire, anever washed, it be never empty, happen pigs trotters potatoes and beans aplenty, men be licking tneir plates clean, it be our way
in future times folks will still envy us closeness to water, river, reeds, leaves, stones, how advanced we are, we be clean ‘n’ happy, we be Troggs

I think you have to own a dishwasher for a while before you can truly appreciate how wonderful they are.

Cook meal, eat meal, put plates/pans/cutlery in dishwasher, switch it on, and go and do something else. Dishwasher can be unloaded next time you need the contents for the next meal.

Or alternately fill sink with soapy water, scrub pans, empty now-greasy water and fill sink with more soapy water. Immerse plates and cutlery and wash it clean, then rinse it under tap to get soap suds off. Now dry everything with a towel unless you have a massive draining board that fits plates and pans. Put everything away. Then go and do something else - except you’ve got less time to do it than you would if you had a dishwasher!

Hmm, interesting! If I don't have to rinse the plates then that could be a game changer - I genuinely think, at 35, I don't know how to use a dishwasher. Clearly my childhood dishwasher experience was not representative - oh the irony of being the one with a sheltered cult existence 😂

Perhaps if you knew how to use a dishwasher correctly you wouldn't have this opinion.

Feel free to sneer at us dishwasher fans. While you're standing over your sink washing dishes by hand, we will sit and relax, smug about our lower water bill.

I was very anti dishwasher before we moved into a rental with one. I swore you could smell when stuff had been washed in one.

maybe the people I knew with one didn’t use salt/rinse aid or there’d been a general improvement - but I loved it when I finally used the thing. Cheapest salt,rinse aid and dishwasher tabs and I’ve never had an issue with weird smelling cups or glasses. It was probably the last fine line that stopped dp being bludgeoned when dd was tiny.

come to the cult side, we have cookies (we baked and didnt have to wash up the pans after... )

Yes!!! My experience is that you can smell the musty aroma of a dishwasher washed glass! And it's cloudy! But maybe there is hope yet!

I also didn't mention pans because I didn't think they could be cleaned in a dishwasher - will it deal with casserole pots etc.?!

I would simply never have anyone over to the house if I didn’t have a dishwasher. 8 lots of crockery, cutlery, cups and glasses? Lose the will to live? No! Bang it in the dishwasher and get on with your life 💃🏼

The point of a dishwasher for me is convenience. It just sits there and washes up while you get on with other things. The byproducts are that it uses less water and energy than washing up by hand, and is more hygenic as it uses far higher temperature water than my hands can cope with with. I have never had one breakdown, but I am sure they do. But then sinks can get blocked, boilers pack up and taps leak, so handwashing up is not maintenance free!!

I do occasionally hand wash glasses, but only if the dishwasher is full and even then I might just do them afterwards.

come to the cult side, we have cookies (we baked and didnt have to wash up the pans after... )

I was with you op but now I'm tempted, sorry

I have one but don't know how to use it. Tbh, from going to peoples houses and the one at work, it put me off