For years we lived in apartments and houses (we've moved 7 times since getting married!) that didn't have dishwashers. Like any other inexperienced dishwasher, I always spent loads and loads of money on sponges. I would scrub the heck out of my dishes, and some how they would never quite get as clean and sparkly as I'd like. Not to mention they harbor bacteria and get really stinky really quick.
In my attempt to have spotless and crustless dishes, pans and the like, I have come to find that dishwashing requires a small arsenal of weapons in fighting those greasy, grimy, crusty and caked on foods. . . here are mine, in no particular order....
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1. The dish rag - I thought, like many people out there, that the sponge got the dishes cleaned the best. Then one day I ran out of them and went back to the old school dish rag like my mom uses. I'd always wondered why she and my aunties always used them. Then I discovered WHY! You can get your dishes clean in half the time because it's bigger than a sponge, and you can clean the surface areas of dirty dishes faster and better. You then wash it and re-use it when it gets yucky. AND you save $$.
2. The Product - For years I've used palmolive for hand washing and whatever I could find for the dishwasher but just like your hair, it's ALL about the product!! Someone once told me that Dawn was the best for hand dishwashing. I purchased some recently and I'm a dawn lover for life. In regards to the dishwasher, I thought that maybe it was broken because it wasn't quite washing the dishes well and so before calling the appliance repair, I decided to see if it was the dishwasher soap we were using called "finish" was the problem. I decided to get a trial size of the cascade with dawn (hey if it's good enough for the hand washing, it must be good for the dishwasher too)...and i was correct! It totally changed the cleanliness and appearance of my dishes!! I <3 dawn="dawn" p="p">
3. The Stainless Steel Scrubbie - Do you have those weird brown stains on the bottom of your pans? Or have a hard time with those baked on foods in your pyrex dishes?!? For years I'd used elbow grease and the sponge to try and get it off with much failure. I was at Target a few months ago and decided to see what those pretty bling bling scrubbies were all about! I went home and it totally brought my old pans back to life! Not to mention its GREAT for tupperware stains and those dishes with the day old spaghetti sauce and dried curry on. No more long soaking!! yay!!
4. The Sponge - In my dissing of the sponge, I do still use it - occassionally. The hard side is best for your non-stick pans. That's about it. I don't use it on really anything else.
5. The Brush - Great for baby bottles and cups!
So hope you all will now have clean and sparkly dishes - I do!!
And yes, I am one of the few people who still use the dishwasher to wash dishes. . . some people just have it as decor, others use it for a drying rack, while one family I know uses it to hold snacks! LOL.
Happy dishwashing.
