3 ms·

Yeah. They still take ~50% of the effort of hand-washing before you can expect them to actually clean anything you put in them, in my experience—our current one

by ashark 9y ago

Yeah. They still take ~50% of the effort of hand-washing before you can expect them to actually clean anything you put in them, in my experience—our current one, though only a year old, is incredibly shitty and takes more like 75%. With a few kids you're running the dishwasher and putting away dishes like 4-5 times a week. Dropping that to 2-3 would be pretty nice. Also dishwashers are entirely useless for something like 1/4 of the items that are dirtied in meal prep + eating (and it's only that low because we have 3 kids, so the dishwashable-item count is higher than for, say, 2 people, while the non-dishwashable count is similar). There's more stuff you don't have to do with a frozen meal and paper plates. Admittedly, this latter point is almost a non-issue if you mise en place and Clean as you Go when cooking, but not every working couple gets home at the same time and sometimes the spouse who consistently and gleefully uses the above gets home too late to cook unless you want to push back the kids bedtimes (god no) and sometimes the spouse who gets home earlier just cannot be convinced to use the above by seemingly any means and gets really snippy when further efforts at convincing are made, no matter how gently. At least I'm quite sure that must be the case for someone. Ahem.

gambiting 9y ago
That has not been my experience with dishwashers at all. I've had 4 different ones so far and never had to do anything other than just swipe solid food off to the bin,never prewashed anything. Usually use the 65C programme on them and everything comes out super clean, there will be an odd thing that is not completely clean but I'm serious when I say that's probably one thing in 1/10 loads. And what sort of things do you use for prep that can't go in the dishwasher? All knives, plastic chopping boards, bowls - all goes straight in the dishwasher. The only things I don't put in it are my frying pans since I have a nice Circulon set and I've already ruined one by putting it in a dishwasher.
- ashark 9y ago
  > And what sort of things do you use for prep that can't go in the dishwasher? All knives, plastic chopping boards, bowls - all goes straight in the dishwasher. The only things I don't put in it are my frying pans since I have a nice Circulon set and I've already ruined one by putting it in a dishwasher. Lots of utensils that are too tall to go in the silverware basket, but tend to fall down and block the arms if you put them on the regular tray section. Pots, pans, mixing bowls, cutting boards. They block too much water and if they're not clean enough to wipe clean with water and a towel in ~10 seconds the dishwasher's not gonna do anything for them anyway. We've owned... oh, 5, maybe 6 dishwashers? All but 2 of them new. None of them have not left several dishes dirty enough in every load that you had to leave them in to run again, or hand wash them after the machine had already "washed" them. None have been any good at all for things that are really dirty and couldn't be hand-cleaned very quickly. If I lived alone I would 100% for sure not bother with one at all. Easily the most frustrating/useless appliance in my house. [EDIT] there's also the problem that anything sitting dirty in a not-yet-full dishwasher can't be used... unless you take it out and hand wash it. Not a problem for plates and stuff, but a real problem for prep-related items.
  - gambiting 9y ago
    I'd love to know the reason why our experiences are so vastly different. Either our cooking styles are very different, or US dishwashers are more inefficient or I don't know what else. But there must be a reason.
    - BrandoElFollito 9y ago
      I was wondering the same. I have a very similar experience to yours (3 dishwashers in France, all of them Bosh or Siemens) and this is one of these wonderful inventions which change life.
dsfyu404ed 9y ago
You can thank the EPA and their energy usage labeling requirements for a large part of the crappiness of modern appliances. People want to see a small number on the yellow sticker so manufacturers don't use as much hot water. The pressure regulator is also usually set very conservatively from the factory for the same reason. I'm surprised I haven't seen shower mixing valves installed with washing machine hookups in new construction. Then again, code would probably change to prohibit it the second it caught on.

by ashark 9y ago

gambiting 9y ago

That has not been my experience with dishwashers at all. I've had 4 different ones so far and never had to do anything other than just swipe solid food off to the bin,never prewashed anything. Usually use the 65C programme on them and everything comes out super clean, there will be an odd thing that is not completely clean but I'm serious when I say that's probably one thing in 1/10 loads. And what sort of things do you use for prep that can't go in the dishwasher? All knives, plastic chopping boards, bowls - all goes straight in the dishwasher. The only things I don't put in it are my frying pans since I have a nice Circulon set and I've already ruined one by putting it in a dishwasher.

ashark 9y ago
> And what sort of things do you use for prep that can't go in the dishwasher? All knives, plastic chopping boards, bowls - all goes straight in the dishwasher. The only things I don't put in it are my frying pans since I have a nice Circulon set and I've already ruined one by putting it in a dishwasher. Lots of utensils that are too tall to go in the silverware basket, but tend to fall down and block the arms if you put them on the regular tray section. Pots, pans, mixing bowls, cutting boards. They block too much water and if they're not clean enough to wipe clean with water and a towel in ~10 seconds the dishwasher's not gonna do anything for them anyway. We've owned... oh, 5, maybe 6 dishwashers? All but 2 of them new. None of them have not left several dishes dirty enough in every load that you had to leave them in to run again, or hand wash them after the machine had already "washed" them. None have been any good at all for things that are really dirty and couldn't be hand-cleaned very quickly. If I lived alone I would 100% for sure not bother with one at all. Easily the most frustrating/useless appliance in my house. [EDIT] there's also the problem that anything sitting dirty in a not-yet-full dishwasher can't be used... unless you take it out and hand wash it. Not a problem for plates and stuff, but a real problem for prep-related items.
- gambiting 9y ago
  I'd love to know the reason why our experiences are so vastly different. Either our cooking styles are very different, or US dishwashers are more inefficient or I don't know what else. But there must be a reason.
  - BrandoElFollito 9y ago
    I was wondering the same. I have a very similar experience to yours (3 dishwashers in France, all of them Bosh or Siemens) and this is one of these wonderful inventions which change life.

dsfyu404ed 9y ago

You can thank the EPA and their energy usage labeling requirements for a large part of the crappiness of modern appliances. People want to see a small number on the yellow sticker so manufacturers don't use as much hot water. The pressure regulator is also usually set very conservatively from the factory for the same reason. I'm surprised I haven't seen shower mixing valves installed with washing machine hookups in new construction. Then again, code would probably change to prohibit it the second it caught on.