I disagree with the energy use you don’t necessarily have to use hot water. And the costs differ if water is heated with gas. To gloss it over that proves your conclusion to be moot. Hand washing for us is a big cost saver on energy
Right? It feels like there are so many tools in our day-to-day life that we've taken for granted for decades upon decades in a way that modernity just *assumes* we know how to optimally use them... but we don't!
The time and effort savings alone makes it worth it. I've had people argue with me that they can finish washing the dishes by hand faster than my dishwasher's 2 hour cycle. I counter by telling them that I only spend time loading and unloading the dishwasher. The dishwasher's working time isn't using my own time. I am free to do other things while it works.
@@MNbenMN I will say, having a "natural mandatory break" on the kind of "medium length trip" where you need to charge _once_ and can plan for it can be kinda nice. Get a gas station coffe and chill out But that's of course driving where there's infrastructure for it, and not going along a vast desert highway or what have you (I'm from Sweden, we don't have a lot of those) Though that's where the _actual_ superior mode of transportation would be a nice option: TRAINS
I washed dishes by hand throughout college (no dishwasher available). When I moved into a place with a dishwasher, I used it avidly, but always wondered if I was wasting water because I didn't own enough dishes to fill a full load. It's good to know for certain that I have not been wasting water as I absolutely would be hand washing for more than 4 minutes.
@@rogerwilco2 yeah that kinda confused me too. We have both a dishwasher and we hand wash just because we have a ton of dishes and we always just fill up the sink like 1/3 of the way and wash everything in there. I also noticed in the video that they werent doing that and just let the water go down the drain which really just confused me
@@rogerwilco2I’m quite convinced that the participants of any dishwasher vs handwasher comparison are running the water the whole time they handwash and thus favoring the dishwasher. I see the same thing happening when people wash their hands, and I wonder who taught them that. But then I see water constantly being ran like that in movie and tv shows…
@@hynnow18for letting water run when you wash your hand (especially in public space), there are reasons (if they don't close the sink using paper towel that reason is in the trash)
@@rogerwilco2 Most people will fill at least one basin partway with water, usually soapy water, which is gonna be at least two gallons even if you're being conservative on a small sink. That means you have two minutes of running the water to rinse the dishes, assuming you don't pre-rinse or have any need to top off the basin, before you're using as much water as the dishwasher. There's definitely a tipping point for loading in too few dishes for the dishwasher to be worth it but most people understand that a single plate would be a waste.
Did you watch this video, and are frustrated because you live in a place without a dishwasher, or without a place to even install one? Look up a countertop dishwasher! I got a Faberware personally. It requires no installation, fits on my counter without issue, takes maybe 5 minutes to load, and saves me many hours every week. I used to have no choice but to hand-wash for 10 years, and I hated it. Getting a countertop dishwasher was a game-changer. It was literally one of the best purchases I've ever made.
1. To fully compare efficiency, also compare the amount of labor involved. The main reason why people buy dishwashers is to reduce the time spent on a repetitive & boring chore. I wanted to write "You had me at time-saving" but it wasn't mentioned. 2. It would help some of us if you also compare older dishwashers, not just "modern." I think mine is 50 years old. It doesn't heat the water, and the hot water supply in the building is set at about 125ºF. Perhaps MinuteFood should do a video about whether to replace an old dishwasher (that isn't broken).
In your case, the water isn't hot enough, so it won't be very effective. If it has the heating element and it's broken, fix it, if it doesn't have, a tabletop dishwasher or getting an electric hot faucet and use that water instead are options. Or buy a new dishwasher and sell yours for someone with very hot hot water.
125F, is about 52C, UK dishwashers run between 51 & 60C, so 52C should be do able, maybe not ideal but useable. Worth checking that the water is running hot before running the dishwasher, ie if the hot feed is next to your hot tap (faucet), run that 'til it's running hot, then start you dishwasher.
If your dishwasher is 50 years old (although I doubt that, as the chances of it not needing replacing due to breaking or whatever are very slim) then I would highly recommend replacing it. Technology has improved, safety standards have improved, a newer dishwasher will clean dishes much better, and will likely use much less water and energy due to more modern energy and water saving methods.
>NaThingSerious : On the other hand, a rule of thumb is to not replace large appliances that still work. Besides the obvious time & money costs to research, buy & install a new unit and to dispose of the old unit, manufacturing processes consume resources and generate pollution. Also, newer appliances tend to break down more quickly because they're not built to last.
@@brothermine2292 I tend to agree, if it does what you need/want, probably no need to change. If its not doing what you want/need, can it be made to do that? If so at what cost? Having said that, if you look at older cars, for instance, newer cars tend to give much better comfort, safer drive, safer in accidents, these happen even if not your fault, cheaper to run. Sometimes it is worth considering an upgrade. Re new stuff being not built to last, I think it is worse I think it is often built not to last. Washing machines are very simple machines really.
Things worth noting. It’s worth scraping solid foods off, but you don’t need to pre-rinse in the sink before going into dishwasher. ALSO, not all things SHOULD go in a dishwasher: certain plastics that deform in high heat, wood utensils that can be ruptured from the high heat, and vacuum sealed containers may not hold their vacuum. SO, THOSE items should be hand-washed just before you run the dishwasher to allow the water to warm up before running the dishwasher. ALSO, on a similar note, I LOVE that this video spoke out about the germ /water temperature while hand washing topic; “washing water with extremely hot water” to kill the germs is sooooo wrong - just use water warm enough that it feels comfortable for you hand - you will NEVER want to warm the water up enough to the point that the hotness kills germs, at that point you are scalding you are hand.
I'm generally pro-dishwasher, but I feel the need to point out that sanitizing is not the same as cleaning. There are times when the dishes may be sanitized (from long exposure to hot water), but not clean (from crusted on food). The fact that sometimes dishes may come out not completely clean, even if they are sanitized, is a major component of feeling like dishwashers are inefficient.
This all the way. If you are doing real cooking, and end up with crusty pots and pans, you can’t just throw them in the dishwasher and walk away. You have to stand there and scrub the crap out of them repeatedly until they are clean of crud, and at that point where they’re ready to go in the dishwasher, they’re basically done anyway. If someone is happy with the results of their dishwasher, I’m convinced they don’t cook. They’re just sticking something on a plate. But if you actually cook, the dishwasher is not saving you any time, because you have to stand there washing only to have the dishwasher wash it again. Now, the sanitizing power of hot water is a valid point, and probably the only convincing argument in this video. If we change the name of a dishwasher to dish sanitizer, I could probably get behind it. And this is probably the crux of the pushback. If you the thing does not *wash* your dishes, then it is not a dishwasher. When it can scrape the crud off of grandma’s turkey pan the day after Thanksgiving, it will be a dishwasher. Until then it is a dish sanitizer.
@@gongcyclist Sounds like this depends on the type of cooking and cookware though. I've cooked with pots and pans and even though the dishwasher can't reliably get rid of all the food crust, it's still a very useful tool. Here's why: 1) It almost always works reliably on dishes 2) For cookware, you might want to manually pre-wash and judge with your personal experience. For me, it's still faster to quickly scrub off big chunks of crust and then load it into the dishwasher, than to do everything manually to the end. If you have like 5 pots from a big meal, going all the way to completely clean for each piece might take you several additional minutes. So much easier to scrape off big crusts and leave the rest to the machine. 3) In my experience, even if a pot comes out of the machine with food crust still on it, it's wayyy easier to remove than trying to scrub it off before you put it into the dishwasher. The dishwasher seems to soften it up and remove large areas of crust; the remaining bits are small pieces that are easily wiped off manually. This probably has to do with the much higher water temperature you get from doing it with the machine first, and several hours of detergent exposure. It's like soaking your pots before washing, but even better!
@@gongcyclist If you cook, you ought to learn some cooking techniques that will greatly reduce the cleaning you have to do. For instance, you can make a gravy with the drippings in that roasting pan, which will basically clean the pan in the process (the leftover gravy can easily be rinsed out by a dishwasher). Pan sauces in general serve the same purpose. For baking, lining things with parchment paper is often a good way to keep the food from sticking to the pan. Maybe not everything you want to cook will make your dishes easy to clean, but you can have a pretty full repertoire of dishes which do.
If it can’t be repaired, they are not terribly difficult to install from new. I couldn’t afford any of the quotes from plumbers, so I looked up some TH-cam videos and read the instructions. There’s generally 4 steps. Add a water supply, add a drain, add power cable, and put it in place. I only needed an adjustable wrench, a Philips head screw driver and a flathead screwdriver for my own and a drill bit. After doing mine I did another for my girlfriend’s house and that one only needed a 1/4 hex nut driver instead of a flathead. I also wasn’t able to turn off the main water supply to get a different valve for the dishwasher, so I added a T fitting so both the sink water and the dishwasher supply are operated by the same valve
If your landlord pays utilities, maybe you should do it! Don't if your home is owned or managed by a corporation, but if you're one of the few folks out there acquainted with a chill landlord, it could be good for both of ya'll
Please note that in the infographic that describes the cycles of the dishwasher, it's clear that _detergent pacs are useless in the prewash_. USE POWDER/GEL DETERGENT and put some in the prewash compartment!
@@doxielain2231 I mean, yeah, obviously. But more importantly I LISTENED to technology connections and started having way more success with my dishwasher:P
*if you need to for some people, living in some places, with some dishwashers, and some dirty dishes, prewash is unnecessary. for others, it's helpful. everyone should try it out, but you may not need it
(speaking for Europe) every dishwasher my family has ever had had a half-load button for when it got stinky and needed to be washed before fully loaded. That tips the efficiency even more towards dishwashers.
I do use a dishwasher because it's convenient, but the water comparison studies are just ridiculous. Even the lowest number 30l is a lot of water for doing dishes. And 447 liter?! Do they do the dishes in bath?
Really, my biggest reason for pre-rinsing isn't because it cleans dishes better per se, but because a dish might sit in the dishwasher for several days before the dishwasher gets full enough to run. Any crumbs or food residue on those dishes in that time just sit there rotting, or worse, attracting bugs. I have actually had ants infest my dishwasher before. Get this, just running the dishwasher does next to nothing to get rid of ants. So it's not about cleaning the dishes better, it's about preventing food from being left out.
@@jakebocaj The more efficient method would depend heavily on the half-load size and the time spent pre-rinsing. However, you are probably right that running smaller, more frequent loads would be more efficient in the end.
But there are times when stains are made out of substances that don't dissolve well in water where a brush is much better at removing it, and putting it in the dishwasher won't remove everything properly.
This! This video moved to goalpost so much to what we don't care about: number of bacteria. The bacteria may be dead, but there's mineral deposits and soap residues on my dishes which smell awful. I always hand-rinse and scrub my dishes after they've come out of the dish washer. A solid brushing/rubbing (even with just the hands) can just not be matched by spraying some water.
@@mistersir3020 If there is soap residue on there, you probably use too much detergent. If you use a powder detergent, try putting less in and see if it helps If you're using pods or other forms of pre portioned detergent, try to find powder, it is cheaper and superior lol
@@mistersir3020also don’t pre rinse dishes: it leaves less stuff for the soap to latch on and you will get streaks. For hardwater there should be different settings regarding how much salt is used. Don’t skip the salt! Super important.
@@giobaldu I don't pre-rinse and the water is softened. Still and all, there's clearly a residu left after a washing machine cycle. I don't give a turd about how many bacteria are on there; I just want my dishes to not have a smell, my food to not absorb a residu from the washing machine. The number of bacteria is entirely inconsequential, nobody ever died from ingesting some stupid bacteria - they all die in the stomach anyway.
I was supervisor of a dish room at a university. We had THOUSANDS of dishes. Sometimes up to a thousand students at once. I hate dishwashing now. I use the dishwasher whenever possible. Edit: Okay it wasn't thousands at once but it sure was after being rotated on busy days. Every night at closing it was a few hundred plates, bowls, cups, pans etc.
Wow, I can't even imagine washing a thousand dishes in one go. I'd probably hate dishwashing even with a dishwasher if I had to do a thousand dishes. To me, your statements sounds similar to this: I was responsible for moving items between offices. The offices are miles apart. Sometimes, I have to go a hundred miles between the two offices. I hate moving things between offices now. I use the car whenever possible instead of walking.
It's actually blowing my mind that some people have a dishwasher and never use it, and even more so that they are proud and happy of that fact! I suppose if they have a truly ancient slumlord model it makes sense, but other than that, what a wild thing.
I enjoy washing the dishes by hand. There’s a meditative quality to the experience. Invariably there are dishes that don’t do well in the dishwasher as well, wooden items and most non-butter knives don’t do well in the dishwasher. It’s also considerably faster to do them by hand allowing for the kitchen to be done in short order. I still use the dishwasher for the bulk of things, but rarely a day goes by that hand washing isn’t also done.
So if you were single, would you run the dishwasher for half a dozen dishes, or just let dirty dishes sit around for a week until the dishwasher was full? I hope you enjoy roaches.
There are small dishwashers available that you can place on your counter, they're also marketed for camping. I have some issues with my hands which made it very painful for me to do dishes so I had to buy one of those and it made my life so much better
@@Snufaay you're largely overestimating newer generations' housing situation. And the few ones that for some miracle have the space for a small one, well, good luck telling the landlord and getting it approved.
@@mattia_carciola I never estimated anybody's counter space at all. Just tried to share the information to others who might need it. I didn't know until last year that there are dishwashers available which are no different from a microwave in size and handling. You place it next to your kitchen sink, with a lose pipe hanging into the sink for the dirty water. I fill the dishwasher by hand from the top, each time before I run it. It's nothing my landlord had to approve since it's not really installed into the kitchen at all. I admit I have a bit more counterspace than my friend who had informed me about the existence of these machines, but she also had one and her "kitchen" in her super tiny apartment was among the smallest kitchen solutions I have ever seen, no counters at all. I know small living spaces and I do know younger generations, I'm not that old myself. I guess it also helps that I do not own a microwave, like I said the dishwasher doesn't need any more room than a microwave
I have to pre-rinse because my dishwasher is one of the smaller portable ones. it doesn't have a connection to the water line so it can't do its own pre rinse cycle
Our dishwasher was broken for a week a bit ago, and the amount of additional time and drying space we had to spend washing dishes (in addition to the usual handwash only/too big for dishwasher items) for a family + pets was insane. Time is money, and dishwashers save so so much working time.
To me the greatest advantage of finally getting a dishwasher was not the cleanliness or energy use, but how much TIME it saved me! That beats all other considerations. But I did notice the glasses looked even cleaner than when I hand washed them. I do still was casseroles by hand though, as the dishwasher would otherwise fill too quickly or I may need it the next day too. I takes me 6 days to fill a load.
I trust my dishwasher to disinfect the dishes, but it doesn't remove stuck-on cheese, among other things, no matter how neatly the dishes are placed, so I will keep pre-scrubbing until I get a better dishwasher.
Do you use pre wash detergent? Every dishwasher is designed to use two doses of detergent, for its two main cycles. The pre wash cycle water gets drained pretty quickly because its the first to go and its the cycle that deals with dishes that are the most dirty. If you dont put detergent in for that cycle, the cycle essentially just gets the dishes wet. Also check to make sure that the water coming from your kitchen sink is hot before turning on the dish washer. If it isnt, whenbyou turn it on the pre wash cycle will be washing with cold water. Do both of these things. Put in some detergent just at the bottom of the dishwasher, literally just throw some in there and then run the sink hot. This will make sure that the pre wash cycle is using hot soapy water instead of cold non-soapy water like its probably been doing. Once the prewash cycle water is drained, the main wash will only have to deal with somewhat dirty dishes and will have a lot more soap to wash them with.
@@brothermine2292 It depends on the foodstuff in question. Generally, no, not to the point that a dishwasher alone will remove it. Soaking can drastically reduce the amount of scrubbing necessary to remove it, though. Cheese, baked goods, anything involving egg can be really obnoxious to remove, especially if you are _cooking_ rather than warming something on a bowl/plate. I spent a year as a dishwasher and eggs and bacon sheets were by far my least favorite things to clean.
Usually not, but people often fill up the sink with two or more gallons of water. You couple that with the water used for rinsing and it comes out to a surprising amount of water. Couple that with the more frequent washing (most people with a dishwasher don’t run it every day), and the VAST majority of households would greatly benefit from a dishwasher from an efficiency standpoint. This doesn’t even take into count the hygienic advantages of dishwashers.
@KrisOsterhout Hygienicly and time efficiency dishwasher wins hands down Hand washing you dont need to rinse your dishes you can quite comfortably do a full load of dishes with 5 or 10 liters. Plus using a dishwasher some things cant be put through it so you will have to hand wash anyways adding to your water usage. Im traveling at the moment so i am pretty water conscious and i use less than 150L a month and that drinking and showering too. Hand washing is more water efficient if you have the time.
I didn't use a dishwasher for a long time until I looked into the research myself about 8 years ago. I don't prerinse anymore after a second look into the research, but I do prescrub certain kinds of foods before I put dishes in the washer because the dishwasher inevitably will fail to dislodge it. I'm glad that using the device is both more efficient and effective overall and only wish all the cookware and non-dishwasher safe items could also be tossed in there. 😛
I honestly couldn't care less about the bacteria. My problem with dishwashers is that they can leave your dishes poorly rinsed and with detergent residues, and because dishwasher detergent produces no foam, you can barely tell if it's there, so you just eat it all up
I'm afraid to put this thought out there ... Recently I had the thought and wondered how much microplastics we put into the environment with the favorite sponge we all use and that you showed. I used the brown natural ones they had before but are no longer available. Great cast iron tee.
Trying to be environmentally conscious is sometimes worse for the environment. Those "brown natural" sponges might have been made from sea sponges, which were nearly overfished to extinction. And the fishing could have contributed more carbon emissions than the manufacture of plastic sponges, similar to how a cotton shopping bag creates hundreds of times more carbon emissions than a single-use plastic bag, so you have to use it for years before it's beneficial for the environment. I'm not saying that plastic sponges are great for the environment either, but these things are never as simple as they seem at first. I'm only guessing, but maybe a luffa (sponge gourd) would be the most environmentally-friendly option?
The catch here is that dishwashers are going to completely blow handwashing out of the water for removal of pathogens, but handwashing will be better for at least some forms of caked on dirt, and the latter is what is visible and generally judged as clean vs dirty day to day. It's an increasingly small difference, particularly when you mix in all the mistakes people make that are easily fixed to get better performance here, but it could explain why people *perceive* handwashing as better.
Yeah, but the nice thing about using the machine for everything by default is that exposes those few cases where you do need to put in some extra effort, so that you can expend that effort WAY more economically. Instead of hand scrubbing every single bowl you ever use on the off chance that the dishwasher might not be able to clean it, you see a little crud that you need to scrape off with a fingernail and a brush once a month or so. Seconds of manual effort vs hours. Refusing to use a dishwasher and washing everything by hand because it sometimes leaves on gunk is like refusing to vacuum and rug-doctoring your floors every week because it doesn't pick up stains.
@@icedragon769 I'm personally a pretty happy regular dishwasher user, I'm more saying that this results in some people misjudging how clean the dishes are between the 2 options
Definitely. I mean if it's the heat that's killing the bacteria, I suspect handwashing and using the oven like an autoclave would be better. Seeing how the water and the soap are used, I just can't find comfort in letting it do the washing part. After all, it relies on the heating part to beat handwashing. A better comparison would be dishwasher minus the heat vs. handwashing.
@@acctsys Well, in fairness, the options in practice are handwashing vs hot dishwasher, and the main goal is really to render the dishes food safe for reuse, so the dishwasher is more fit for purpose, it's just that people are used to judging them by visible dirt so it creates the appearance of handwashing being better. Handwashing and oven baking probably would be more effective, but not by much, and handwashing alone is already a lot more resource and time intensive than a dishwasher, it would be even worse if you then baked all your dishes for an hour afterwards
The problem with the cleanliness studies is the endpoint. No one is swabbing their dishes at home and sending them for bacterial cultures to judge if they are "clean". People judge cleanliness by food residual left on dishes. If the dishwasher always leaves some food stuck on, people are not going to consider it clean. Therefore they will hand wash instead to make sure they can directly remove any bits of food.
My dishwasher very rarely leaves any pieces of food stuck to it. When it does, I simply remove it by hand knowing that it’s still a clean dish because of how hot the water got.
@@LDogSmiles Facts. My brother ALSO claims his dishes from his dishwasher are clean...... No.... No, they are not... If I pick up a Pyrex bowl and it still has a greasy film on it after coming out of the dishwasher..... It's not clean...
@@sectorcodecits annoying to use though when you know theres gonna be a small chance every dish you use still has some food residue caked on because you used a dishwasher
This is one of your best videos so far, congratulations! Quite solid research, answers the unaddressed questions from the previous video (which is the biggest point), and it has great visuals and sounds
I'm very meticulous when washing dishes. I use really hot water and am very thorough, so I'm probably at least competitive with a dishwasher when it comes to cleanliness... but I'm also pretty slow at washing dishes. If you are as thorough as you need to be when hand washing, you are going to be far far slower than a dishwasher.
The idea that some people have dishwashers but refuse to use them is mind blowing. I HATE washing dishes by hand. I would gladly put one in my apartment if I could.
I've had access to a Dishwasher for the last decade of my life and I haven't used it at all, due to two reasons: - Bachelor life meaning I only use a small handful of dishes/tableware - Owning a low number of dishes in the first place I feel like the best use of a Dishwasher is when you use a lot of dishes and you own a lot of dishes to cycle through. It's hard for me to justify using the Dishwasher when I only really use one dish and one fork at a time. However, I imagine the situation will change when a family is involved. Two people plus a child is going to generate a lot of dishes (and will need to own a lot of dishes in the first place). Good to know dishwashers are efficient and effective!
I'm in pretty much the same situation as you. I lived in an apartment without a dish washer for a few years, and pretty much just washed and reused the same two plates and bowls over and over. The rest of the set just sat in the cubbord. Now that I have a dishwasher though, I just slowly fill it throughout the week and run it once I've use the last plate, bowl, or fork etc. I bought a cheap dish set forever ago that has 8 of everything. It's not enough to fill the dishwasher, but I'm only running it once or twice a week.
One of the most common dishes, are in fact pots and pans, used daily for cooking at home. Sooo, the more you like to cook, especially when you like variety; it also adds up. Having a partner, or even a roommate or two who cook, seriously makes it worthwhile. Saves on food cost too- though, nothing beats cheap ramen, or cooked beans for cost (definitely eat the beans; much healthier, and more filling. ) At any rate, just cooking for yourself even, you probably don't need a washer. Definitely nice to have though! The countertop one another comment suggested is likely a great investment of you get more living mates! Love and Peace folks, best of luck in your pursuits ❤
If I'm left on my own for a couple of weeks, it takes about 3 days to generate enough dishes to run the dishwasher. I don't change what I'm cooking or the amounts, I just put more away in the fridge. The bulk of the load ends up being the pots from the cooking and larger containers used for leftovers, with the plates and glasses being a minority.
At the house where I have lived most of my life, none of the dishwashers we've had (we've had several of them) have been very good at cleaning dishes so we ALWAYS have to wash off every little spec of grime from the dishes before we load the dishwasher otherwise the dishes end up even dirtier once they get out of the dishwasher.
So glad to see part 2 of this series! Your research and the papers you cited were very informative for me, and the animations are engaging as hell. Keep it up!
My mom once said nobody in their right mind likes doing dishes and since I approved, it became my test to potential partners. These people in America boggle my mind, how are they so proud about it? Out of all people. The only reason to not use dishwasher is if you're stay at home parent priding yourself for doing unnecessary chores to fill the day, or if you have pans or other things that can't be put in the dishwashing machine. Washing dishes by hand as a student for 14 years has been some of the most miserable parts of my life. I got dishwashing machine at some point but had to move in a place that has too little room to remove a cupboard for dishwashing machine and it's expensive to install because it has to be made by a professional to apply for insurance. Actually they just turn the water valve, you have to pay more for them to install it, you have to install it and pay for them to turn the valve. I don't know anyone who trusts their dishwashing machine so much that they wouldn't pre-rinse. Even with pre-rinsing you can sometimes find food scraps on the dishes. I guess "not necessary" is everyone's subjective experience.
Dishwashers serve no practical purpose for me. All they clean is plates, bowls, spoons cups, etc. Which are all dishes used to eat the food. We all wash our own plates and spoons as soon as we eat. And it's very hard either On an average day, most difficult dishes ro wash are the ones used for cooking, tye grinder, the mixer, the cutting plate. Grating board. Big pots with burned food inside them etc. None if which can be fit in dishwasher...
don't pre-rinse dishes, pre-scrub them with a tiny amount of water (no soap needed) to get rid of any chunks that won't come off easily. Takes minimal effort and water, and means the dishwasher will never leave any dirt on dishes.
Theres an issue of cleaning vs. Sterilization Most dishwashers cannot remove tougher bits that instead bake on and stay adheered. That requires human intervention. The temp may be way higher in a dishwasher, but a human can apply much more pressure in the place its needed to remove debris (hard scrubbing). Dishwashers are great sterilizers, not always great cleaners
Something worth mentioning, bacteria doesn't mean bad or dirty. Biodiversity is very important (for many things including your gut health). And ingesting soap is very bad so make sure to rinse your dishes properly if you hand wash
In My hostel most longterm guests do not wash dishes at home and it shows, i found greassy plates, coffe and tea stained glasses, they definetly dont wash dishes from all sides, they dont use sponges and rarely they use dish soap. So after our guests leave we have to wash dishes again so we use dishwasher, we have to clean cabinets and drawers too, even dishes that were not in use because they magically get mixed with dirty ones. I will sound like someones mom but like... Idk if i wash my dishes i do it on the bottom side as well because eventually they get stacked on a pile in a cabinet
It only makes no sense to not use a dishwasher if you have enough dishes that need cleaning. Not only do I live alone, I use a pretty small set of dishes daily: two plastic bowls, a multicooker bowl/pan, a tablespoon, a teaspoon, a fork, a mug, and a knife. Plastic dishes and knives are recommended against being put in a dishwasher, the former can deform because of the heat, and the latter can get dull; the multicooker pan will probably not even fit in one, and I'm sure it's not allowed to go in it either. I have literally zero reason to buy a dishwasher for two spoons, a fork, and a mug.
@@Lernos1 Well in that case: 1. Buy a real set of dishes and fill up dishwasher once every couple days. 2. Knives don't go dull in dishwasher - this warning is either from knives having untreated wooden handles that get damaged by water or weird japanese knives made of iron/carbon steel that rust easily. There is literally nothing else contacting knife than hot water solution with detergent soluable dirt. Or buy a mini dishwasher - they're still more cost effective than handwashing.
@@michahalczuk9071 Why would I buy a set I'm not going to use? I've been at it for 7 years. Sounds like inventing new problems to me. Second, are you sure a dishwasher is still more cost effective than less than 4 minutes of water running (I don't leave my tap open all the time duh), especially considering that hot water doesn't use electricity on its own (piped directly in), unlike a dishwasher, and electricity is more costly than hot water where I live?
@@Lernos1 4 minutes of running hot water is waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay more than any dishwasher would use. Even including the detergent and running power, it's still going to be much more cost effective unless you count your time as genuinely worthless.
For environmental purposes thought, the amount of energy and water used to build the dishwasher should be considered (like a lifecycle assessment). I think there are some studies on that, and it gives some points to handwashing.
Very nice video! I do not currently own a dishwasher, but have in the past and wondered about the efficiency. I think that with a bit of care it is possible to defeat the machines ^^ Of course, my case is perhaps special... Firstly, dish-washing is a relaxing activity for me, which I do while catching up with podcasts or chatting with my family. Secondly, we're a small family, and do not own enough dishes to fill a machine; thirdly, I only ever use hot water for dish washing for a few weeks in the year, and I do dishes in two rounds (see below). I am definitely checking your tips in the future, keep up the great work! My dish-washing strategy: first with a small sprayer, I get dishes slightly wet, then scrub solid residue (with my fingers, not a sponge). This is done over the main pan which I will wash later, so that any collected water helps soak it. Similarly, I clean things in batches, first soaping a few items, then rinsing the batch (over the remaining dishes, so that the soap contributes to the soaking of whatever items are next). I think typically the tap stays open for about 4 minutes as you mention, but I ought to measure that to be sure! Finally, I often eat out of the pan, so as to have one plate less to clean (but I guess "using fewer dishes" counts only partially as dish-washing strategy haha).
If this is the case when why do I keep having dried on food still stuck to my plates from the dishwasher? I don't think this takes into account people who only wash dishes once per week. We don't create enough dishes to run the dishwasher more than that. Most days, we accumulate 0 plates
Sounds like you have an old dishwasher and you're letting food dry. Put used dishes in the sink with water in them until you're ready to load and start right away. My dishwasher pump was failing and this happened to me. Then I threw it out and bought a Bosch. No problems since.
Are you using gel packs? Add a bit of powder detergent in for the rinse cycle. Also run the water hot before starting, Top tips from Technology Connections vid and the results are night and day.
@@gladitsnotme yeah food dries because if we leave it in a filled sink for 4-5 days it starts to smell. Otherwise we're right back at pre-rinsing, right? This dishwasher isn't that old, maybe 5 years
@@MaxPower417 using those Cascade (maybe not that brand) dishwashing packs, yea. Where would you add powder detergent? In the same opening as the packet, just pour some at the bottom then toss it on top?
@@Boombocks_Studio when you close the little door/cap with the pod you should see there is a little depression on top and that’s where you can put a little powder/gel. It’s specifically for the rinse cycle, where right now you are using just water because the door with the detergent doesn’t pop open until after the rinse.
what i would be interested in is what happens when you factor in dishwasher malfunction (mine was having trouble drawing water properly the other day and that often means that one or two loads end up not properly cleaned and you can't just run the thing again in those cases) and generally instances where you have to do some secondary handwashing (pots and pans sometimes don't get properly clean and again, this is dried gunk, you can just run it again)
Every time I see a "dishwashers are more efficient than hand washing" claim, I'm reminded that a lot of people hand wash like lunatics... Every house and apartment I've lived in in Australia has a dual sink, you 1/3 fill one with soapy water and 1/3 fill the other with clean rinse water, and you can usually get through more than a dishwasher can. Dishwashers are great because of labour saving, but they're only more water efficient than the most deranged way of wasting water while doing the dishes.
@@gladitsnotme then rinse in a bucket next to the sink? And don't give me that soap residue malarkey, dishwashers recycle the rinsing water too, and people are fine with using those
I am not concerned about bacteria. I don't put raw meat on my dishes. The problem with dish washer is the stuck on rice they can't wash out of without physical scrubbing. Another problem is the continuous use and wash in between dishes so I don't need a huge amount of them.
As someone who lives alone, I definitely spend less than 4 minutes washing dishes a day (not including pans that can't go in the dishwasher anyway), and certain dishes I wash, I need clean and ready for the next day. So my dishwasher is a glorified drying (and storage) rack. Only exception is I'll run it after hosting a dinner party or something where I have a large number of dishes to clean at once
I have a small dishwasher and a good amount of dishes (the single tenant lifestyle is a lawless wasteland with no standards or conventions, so it's not easy to gauge how many dishes are "normal" for one person to own. But in my case, I have a few plates, a few bowls, a bunch of old glass containers/ jars I use as drinking glasses, some cups, a set of utensils etc etc etc). Which means I don't need to wash most dishes immediately for me to have some clean ones the next day. I can just load up my machine and run it once it's full (which is almost exactly when I've used up all my dishes), and repeat the cycle. Now, even though I got the cheapest viable dishwasher available to me, I know that not everyone has the money, the space or some other capacity to get one. BUT THAT ASIDE THOUGH, I do not know of any good reason to not use dishwashers, even for people who live alone
Stainless steel and enameled pans can go into dishwasher no problem. Tbh i think non stick would do there fine too, as long as you place them so they don't scratch on the pins
We use a dishwasher at my house, but I've seen dishes come out of there with food still stuck on them one too many time, so I always give my dishes an extra hand wash at the sink before using them.
Why do some dishes (especially plastics) have residual detergent fragrance after going through the dishwasher? Are there detergent/rinse aid residues on dishes?
Sometimes. It really depends on which soaps you're using, how hot the water is, among other issues. If you have residue, consider switching soap to either a different brand, or a less concentrated formula for a little while and see what happens. As for the rinse aids, it SHOULDN'T leave residue, so if you're concerned that's what's causing it, I'd save testing the removal of that for last. Two other tips! Make sure that the water in your dish washer is actually hot. Cold water circulating is less likely to get gunk off than hot water. Secondly, make sure you're not overloading your washer, or stacking dishes strangely. If some plates/bowls are overlapping, and water can't rinse that particular dish, then the residue is gonna stay there.
Putting plastic in dishwashers isn't recommended. There was a big study on plastic water bottles in The Netherlands and it showed after 15 washes in a dishwasher it started to drop micro plastic. Which can't be healthy for you. Because they get to hot. Besides that, non plastic silverware is usually more robust which leads in less waste.
Dishwashers don't make sense for me personally. My husband and I either use a very tiny number of dishes per day, in which case any food would be hard-baked on by the time we ran a load, OR we use a bunch of really big stuff all at once, which would be difficult to fit in the washer. Plus we have a lot of plastic bowls and lids that can't be super-heated and would need to be hand-washed anyway. Along with our glasses, which have designs on them that can't be super-heated. And our wooden utensils, which would be damaged by being super-heated. We don't use sponges to wash our stuff - we use brushes. We let everything air-dry in a rack so it's not being dried with a towel (who has time for that?). And there is NO REASON to leave the water running the entire time you wash dishes. Of COURSE that wastes water. Turn the water on long enough to get the dishes and brush wet, then turn it off, and leave it off until you're ready to rinse everything off, using the rinse water from one thing to pre-rinse another. Yes, I know I still use more water than a dishwasher, but I would have to do that anyway because a lot of stuff we own has to be hand-washed. But I'm too much of an edge-case to ever find representation in these kinds of videos. :\
The biggest difference: TIME.Washing dishes by hand simply takes a lot of time you can use for other things. When free time is already at a premium for you this begins to matter a lot.
This is why I use my dishwasher even for smaller loads. 5 coffee mugs, a popcorn bowl, some tumblers and a baking pan are my typical load and I know I'm saving water and time.
Ugh! Sure does. It's maybe 15 minutes to solve the puzzle of loading the dishwasher, and about 45 for the tedious chore of washing the same amount by hand.
I've done a 180 on dishwashers in the last 2 years. I always suspected that they could be better at cleaning than doing it by hand just from a chemical perspective: hotter water is better at cleaning, and the dishwasher tablets are probably formulated to be especially good at cleaning in hot water. But it's only when I started learning about HOW a dishwasher works, that I saw just how much more efficient it is than handwashing. So now it seems to tick all the boxes for me, when compared to by hand: - Convenient - Effective/hygienic - Efficient/eco-friendly Admittedly, I also understand that not all households have a dishwasher and that may be influenced by factors like wealth, where you live, etc. But for those of us who have a dishwasher, it's one of those things where the most convenient option is also the most environmentally friendly one (under most circumstances), where in most everyday areas it's the opposite.
What needs extra attention by hand before seems to be very model-dependent. Put a pan that had been used to do scrambled eggs in my previous dishwasher and it would only get half of it off. The new one seems to get it all. You really need to just do some experiments to find out the limitations of your machine, then give extra treatment to what it can't handle before putting it in.
I have a dishwasher at home, but my parents have never used it. The issue is that now we cannot use it even if we wanted to, because my parents have turned it into a storing space 😅
The only thing that i haven't seen people actually compare - washing dishes with cold/cool water vs dishwasher. I tend to simply use cold water for hand washing so there, i am definitely saving the electricity but wasting a lot of water. However, the overall cost would be lower in hand washing in thaf case since water is cheaper than electricity.
If there are hard chunk stains, they need pressure to be taken down, which dishwashers can't do. Moreover, my mom, who is diligent with cleaning, tried a dishwasher and dishes came out visibly dirty, so they only work for relatively clean dishes.
Dishwashers use chemicals in the detergent for this, combined with the hot water that rinses for a long period of time, this combination cleans almost anything. I have personally tested this with my own dishwasher and it effortlessly cleans even completely encrusted gunk that has been hardened and crusted for over 4 days on plates or pans, and even on knives with a small surface area, or spatulas that are dirty on both sides with crusted gunk at the edge of it. No matter what I put in, the machine cleaned it completely spotless to the point I almost didn't believe how effective this machine really is. I literally started putting things in thinking "Checkmate, there's no way THIS will come out spotless", but then it did...
Not only hard. Some cheeses, some fats, and pretty much anything egg is difficult for most _industrial-grade_ dishwashers with strong chemical treatments to remove.
I'm Indian and I put my dishwasher through trial by fire. After cooking curries and gravies, I scrape down food pieces/crusts and soak the dishes in water. This helps dislodge food pieces so dishes come out visibly clean. Wooden/sensitive utensils are hand washed.
At the cabin where we have to haul in the water, you'd be surprised at how little is needed if you do it with low water usage in mind. Sure the water is not super hot but then the rinse is done with water that was boiled at way hotter then 65. Done with no extra energy half of the year as your heating the cabin anyway.
Fun fact: my dishwasher saves rinse water to use as wash water next time. And it has a separate Sanitize cycle that brings the water up to a really high temperature.
Those studies should really control for people who are insanely wasteful when hand washing dishes, I have a cousin that would wash and rinse the silverware one at a time with the water running the whole time.
Still have to scrub the dishes to remove most gunk before you load them in the dishwasher, not necessarily pre-rinse. Every dishwashing machine that I have ever used, commercial ones in fast food or home appliances, left lots of gunk on them if the dishes didn't get a fair scrub before hand, just a wet scrubber is needed.
use soap in the pre wash container (or just throw some extra soap in the tub outside of the soap compartment if your washer doesn’t have one) and run the tap hot before starting the dishwasher, trust me
@@binglebongle8601 Dried on stuff on plates and other stuff, and wood utensils, they don't come off in the dishwasher. I run about 3 cups of water into a small dirty pot and then scrub them with a rough pad, loosens it up for the dishwasher. Have been using a dishwasher both professionally and at home for over 40 years, all the same story. The damn things don't scrub, they spray, and the pressure isn't high enough for many things.
This is for the most part what I had expected, but one thing, we don't let our tap run while we wash, we fill our sink ( which is probably like 6l max ) and then wash our dishes in that
I would _love_ to be able to do less handwashing! But my MiL's kitchen is _full_ of things that can't go in the dishwasher. Anything that comes with a nonstick coating, she chooses that in preference to anything sensible; cheap plastics that will melt; aluminums that will lose their finish; heirloom china where the pattern will wash off; pots and serving dishes that just plain won't fit... Plus, even in the new modern dishwasher, many of the heat-safe plastics cling to fats and _still_ come out with a soapy residue clinging to that.
I'm Asian (and not living in a Western country) and we don't do dishwashers. Also I cook and most expensive things can NOT go in a dishwasher. Glasses, knives, wooden stuff, fancy delicate china and custom crockery and teaware, you name it. I'd use one in a heartbeat if I were a cheap restaurant dealing with generic white porcelain plates but that does not describe my household.
@@jiahaotan696 Thats actually a common myth in non-Western countries, dishwashers can handle all those things. Glasses, knives, wooden stuff, even fancy delicate china and teaware. Dishwashers have different settings, much like laundry machines do, and you can choose the setting you want. Do you want it scrubbed hard? Sure. Do you want it delicate? Also fine. Do you want to do it with cold water? Its just a button away.
I love to see that your merch partnership is with DFTBA! The rest of the video is, of course, also great, but I'm always thrilled to see more popularity go towards the endeavors of the Green brothers.
หลายเดือนก่อน +1
I’m a bit confused about the information on handwashing. I understand that high temperatures (like 60°C) can kill bacteria, which is important for dishwashing. However, I’ve also heard that washing hands with soap and warm water is effective because it physically removes bacteria and viruses, rather than killing them. Could you please clarify how these two pieces of information fit together? I still agree, but compact living, rentals and office kitchen may not have a dishing machine.
Just wash the dishes right after you use them and you get most of these benefits. It's the absolute best habit I've developed. Unless you eat from 10 plates at a time, it takes about 5 seconds to wash almost any dish if you don't let the food dry on it
I am all in for using a dishwasher, but what about the environmental impact of dishwasher detergent? I guess it goes roughly along with the water usage (i.e. hand washing uses more water, hence also more soap), but how much more aggressive is dishwasher detergent than normal soap?
It should be around the same amount of impact as normal soap, but you're likely using less detergent in the dishwasher. Main thing about dishwasher detergent vs normal dish soap is that the dishwasher detergent just doesn't foam up. If you are concerned though, consider using powder instead of something like a detergent pod. The pods can only be deployed during the wash cycle, so they're typically more powerful and more concentrated. Whereas the powder you can more easily choose how much detergent you add.
It depends on the choice of detergent. If you're using the powder or tablets, it probably contains bleach, which is not exactly a nice chemical to deal with, but it's mostly a problem for people with septic systems rather than municipal sewers. Septic systems are affected because they depend on bacterial activity to function, and bleach kills bacteria. In a municipal sewer, most of the bleach will break down into simple compounds like table salt and water, but there is evidence that a small portion may form chlorinated organic compounds, which could be carcinogenic in large enough quantities (more research is needed). If you're using the goop, then there's probably no bleach in it, just soap (surfactants) and enzymes. I find it hard to believe that the enzymes used in dishwashing will survive wastewater treatment, but surfactants may have environmental effects. Those chemicals are also present in the powder and tablets, and some kind of surfactant will be present in basically any means of washing anything (dishes, clothes, hands, the body, etc.), so it's not as if this is avoidable (but maybe we can find surfactants that cause less harm). As for hand-washing dish soap, you're likely to find surfactants and possibly something like lactic acid (to kill bacteria and/or descale surfaces), which again can have implications for septic systems if used in large enough quantities, but seems unlikely to cause broader environmental issues (lots of animals produce lactic acid naturally as part of their metabolism).
This is actually a good point. Especially with tablets and capsules... the soluble film they are wrapped in has a warning along the lines of "toxic to fish and aquatic life". Good thing there's no way for it to end up in natural water courses! (I'm British and that was sarcasm)
@@fuzziestlumpkin With regards to the toxicity, that's mostly in its pure, concentrated form. So basically, don't toss one of the pods in the river; if a fish eats that, it'll die. However, once the pod is in the wash, it completely breaks down in the water, and just lets all the soap out. That mixture will not only be extremely diluted, but will just be sent out with sewage anyway, to be processed later, so there's no real environmental impact any more than other types of soap.
I find there's always like pressed in gunk after a dishwasher cycle. Even if its technically sterilised, it just isn't something I'm gonna use without handwashing again myself. I get that 'I'm not stacking right' or whatever, but I've not yet managed to get it right at all, especially cutlery. Also, I just can't fit half the stuff I need washing in there so I have to mix between dishwasher and handwash anyway. Becomes more of an inconvenience overall. I've not gotten salmonella yet so seems handwashing is fine
Unfortunately people don't like this option and I understand why, but I designate a counter for dirty dishes and the dishes that sit inside my dishwasher are clean. Dishes sitting on a counter get dry really quickly, which means they dont smell or attract insects. I live alone and go weeks in between cycles with no problems. Another option is to buy a dishwasher with an air purifying system, such as the beko ionguard system, but I dont depend on it for dirty plates
It might still be more water effective to run the dishwasher more often, like when it's 1/3 to 1/2 full, than to pre rinse each dish and only running at full capacity
I used to use my dishwasher all the time but I realize I use a lot of kitchenware that isn’t dishwasher safe throughout my cooking, (knives, nonstick pans, wooden utensils, wooden cutting boards) So i end up just doing everything myself and using the dish washer as a rack
Run the tap until it's hot before running the dishwasher! The dishwasher is connected to the hot water supply so if you actually supply it hot water and not water that's been sitting and chilling in pipes, you can actually get good cleaning out of it
HERE is how I hand-wash dishes: I use a sponge with a nylon wrap thing around it to make it semi-abrasive. I DO NOT load the sink with water. I pre-rinse dishes then load the sponge with the new Palmolive With Oxiclean and about 25% ammonia. That combination cuts grease like a hot knife through butter. I stack up the soapy dishes on the sink, then rinse them with HOT as I can stand water. This works fantastically and I bet if they were examined they would be very close to germ-free. Two things that you said apply here: It ISN'T energy efficient and it takes time. The issue is, I don't have room for a dishwasher in my kitchen. 😨
I bet that you would still find that your dishes aren’t as clean as a dishwasher but probably far cleaner than the average hand wash. However, given that you don’t have room for a dishwasher, I’d say you’re doing the best possible cleaning you can.
I first wet the dishes and wipe them with a sponge and detergent. During this process I don't leave the tap open all the time for this. Then I rinse the dishes under the tap. I use 3 - 5 L of hot water at most for ten dishes Where did you get those figures
When i wash dishes by hand, i dump as many as i can in a tub filled with hot water, and let them sit for 1 minute, to then skrub em. Wouldent this way save more water, than continuously having the tab on?
You still need to rinse If you reuse the water to rinse, then you're compromising in safety. Even if you do use less water, it's probably not saving you a whole lot of money For my rates, 1000 gallons = $4.40 Or 1 gallon = $.0044 Not a lot of savings
@@hector-m-carrillo *DO* you still need to rinse? The only items I rinse are glasses, to avoid soap spots. Anything else goes on the drying rack for some number of minutes before being hand dried. By then most of the water has dripped or evaporated off. I see no evidence of anyone getting ill from the small amounts of bacteria on dishes, cutlery and crockery.
@@AthAthanasius soap is primarily a surfactant, meaning it works by wrapping dirt/bacteria/oil in bubbles. This is important because a lot of things like to stick onto surfaces. Soap does have antimicrobial properties - as in actively killing - but it primarily works through those bubbles. medicine-yale-edu/news-article/why-soap-works/ Without rinsing, you are just letting everything that was trapped inside the bubbles free; which accomplishes very little. They could have gone down the drain instead. This is then followed by you using a drying rag to clean the soap off, meaning your dish cloths are gathering bacteria significantly more quickly than the average. We don't have a lot of data on how many people get sick from this because it's very hard to find out *where* someone got sick from. But let's just assume the number of people who have gotten sick is >0. Given that dishwashers are overwhelminglf more likely to be cleaner and cheaper, why would you risk those >0 persons with the worse alternative.
soap is primarily a surfactant, meaning it works by wrapping dirt/bacteria/oil in bubbles. This is important because a lot of things like to stick onto surfaces. Soap does have antimicrobial properties - as in actively killing - but it primarily works through those bubbles. Google why soap works and go to the Yale link Without rinsing, you are just letting everything that was trapped inside the bubbles free, which accomplishes very little; they could have gone down the drain instead. This is then followed by you using a drying rag to clean the soap off, meaning your dish cloths are gathering bacteria significantly more quickly than the average. We don't have a lot of data on how many people get sick from this because it's very hard to find out *where* someone got sick from. But let's just assume the number of people who have gotten sick is >0. Given that dishwashers are overwhelmingly more likely to be cleaner and cheaper, why would you risk those >0 persons with the worse alternative.
That is very interesting. I live in Brazil and we don't really use dishwashers that much. My dad owns a fairly modern one and he barely uses it in his household. Only when they have like A TON OF DISHES, like when they had ppl over, etc. Def not on day to day and I guess I kinda soaked that in. I never even considered a dishwasher.
the only dish detergent that gets dishes properly clean in my dishwasher leaves a slippery residue on the dishes after the cycle. i usually run the dishwasher a second time with some bleach to breakdown whatever that is. i suspect it's the rinse aid in it and i don't want to ingest chemicals.
Me: "Umm... these utensils are encrusted with dried-up bits of food, and all the glassware looks like a foggy day in London..." The Dishwasher: "It's all perfectly sterile, I promise!" Me: "That is not the issue!" Hyperbole aside, I really don't care if there's some trace amounts of bacteria left on my hand-washed dishes. My immune-system needs the workout - an overly sterile life is how you wind up developing a ton of autoimmune conditions. The trouble just is that, if you live alone, you either run a dishwasher that's 5% full - which, even according to the rather optimistic numbers presented in this video, isn't very efficient - or you let stuff sit in the dishwasher for *days,* accumulating until it's sorta-kinda-full at least... at which point the gunk covering them will have dried up and become basically impossible for the machine to clean properly. So the results are either disgusting, or disgustingly wasteful.
"become basically impossible for the machine to clean properly" A classic example of underestimating your dishwasher, as most people do. The dishwasher will clean almost anything, even encrusted gunk on a pan that hasn't been washed for 3 days after using it. I didn't really believe this at first either, but then I just ran my dirty plates that had been sitting in the sink for 4 days with encrusted food scraps all over them through the dishwasher as a test, and they came out completely spotless and perfectly clean, even the most encrusted scraps were completely removed. The only thing you have to be aware of is if you have a filter, and also if things are extremely oily, as oil can clog either the drain, or the water drainage pipe further downstream. For large amounts of oily residue, just use a paper towel to wipe the majority of it off, and you can put it into the machine just fine. As for quantity of dishes, if you live alone, just learn to cook for yourself. You will be able to fill up a dishwasher more than enough to make it reasonably full after 2 days, and those two days that plates are sitting anywhere are not a problem for any dishwasher. Even then, modern dishwashers have different programs, shorter programs, half wash programs, and all kinds of options, so if you have a very small amount of dishes that you want done now, you can just run it on an alternate program and it will wash more efficiently than you would yourself. Ooh and the glassware issue you have is because of hard water. You need to add water softener to the dishwasher, which completely eliminates this problem. Modern dishwashers have a special compartment for exactly this purpose, to add water softener and keep your glassware crystal clear. These issues you are having are simply because you do not know how to use a dishwasher, which is very common.
@@luka188 So... in order to avoid the minor inconvenience of hand-washing my dishes, I just need to... spend a ton more time and effort on more large-scale cooking-projects, on a daily basis, in order to generate enough pots, pans, plates and utensils to fill the dishwasher in a reasonable times? Duly noted.
Adding a small amount of detergent in the pre rinse makes it so much better. Which is as simple as putting extra detergent on the door or in the pre rinse section You should also be using less detergent in the main wash and getting some water softener if your glasses are getting foggy. The issue with dishwashers are due to improper use. Using things the right way will allow you to get better results
@@FemmyFoxxo This is not a matter of improper use but people who do not really cook nor pay much attention talking down out of willful ignorance. There are a fair number of foodstuffs that dishwashers have difficulty removing. Detergent is not remotely adequate to remove some of the harder or more resilient residues if you have anything more than slightly dinner plates.
Because one offers convenience and the other doesn't. Is this really that hard of a question for you? Do you need to go back to grade school to learn basic rhetoric?
A lot of people misuse the dishwasher and attribute its failure to the machine and not their incorrect operation (not using pre-wash soap, not running the sink to remove cold water from the pipes before turning the dishwasher on, etc), a bunch of people also don't even try it, they hear from someone that it doesn't work so they don't even bother with it
@@coroner2141 what even are you trying to say? I'm going to assume you're implying dishwashers don't save time, which the video agrees with - the average dishwasher takes 2-4 hours to clean dishes. Until you realize that 'dishwasher time' is not 'your time', and you can do other stuff whilst the dishwasher chugs away.
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I disagree with the energy use you don’t necessarily have to use hot water. And the costs differ if water is heated with gas. To gloss it over that proves your conclusion to be moot. Hand washing for us is a big cost saver on energy
After Technology Connections video and this, I now know how to actually use my dishwasher
Right? It feels like there are so many tools in our day-to-day life that we've taken for granted for decades upon decades in a way that modernity just *assumes* we know how to optimally use them... but we don't!
I did it after the old TC video
Just got through watching a few hours of dishwasher content there
LOVE tech connections! i really appreciate these scientists teaching me how to live most effectively
Indeed Alec's obsession is the next level
The time and effort savings alone makes it worth it. I've had people argue with me that they can finish washing the dishes by hand faster than my dishwasher's 2 hour cycle. I counter by telling them that I only spend time loading and unloading the dishwasher. The dishwasher's working time isn't using my own time. I am free to do other things while it works.
Exactly. The time the dishwasher takes (compared to doing it by hand) is only relevant if you need clean dishes right this minute.
This is especially true for modern dishwashers that open the door on their own. You don’t even need to take time to open it to let them dry!
Same is true for EV charging...
@@markotriesteThat doesn't bring much comfort a few hundred miles into a long road trip.
@@MNbenMN I will say, having a "natural mandatory break" on the kind of "medium length trip" where you need to charge _once_ and can plan for it can be kinda nice. Get a gas station coffe and chill out
But that's of course driving where there's infrastructure for it, and not going along a vast desert highway or what have you (I'm from Sweden, we don't have a lot of those)
Though that's where the _actual_ superior mode of transportation would be a nice option: TRAINS
I washed dishes by hand throughout college (no dishwasher available). When I moved into a place with a dishwasher, I used it avidly, but always wondered if I was wasting water because I didn't own enough dishes to fill a full load. It's good to know for certain that I have not been wasting water as I absolutely would be hand washing for more than 4 minutes.
But you don't need to run the water for the time you are doing the dishes?
How do people wash dishes by hand that makes them use so much water?
@@rogerwilco2 yeah that kinda confused me too. We have both a dishwasher and we hand wash just because we have a ton of dishes and we always just fill up the sink like 1/3 of the way and wash everything in there. I also noticed in the video that they werent doing that and just let the water go down the drain which really just confused me
@@rogerwilco2I’m quite convinced that the participants of any dishwasher vs handwasher comparison are running the water the whole time they handwash and thus favoring the dishwasher. I see the same thing happening when people wash their hands, and I wonder who taught them that. But then I see water constantly being ran like that in movie and tv shows…
@@hynnow18for letting water run when you wash your hand (especially in public space), there are reasons (if they don't close the sink using paper towel that reason is in the trash)
@@rogerwilco2 Most people will fill at least one basin partway with water, usually soapy water, which is gonna be at least two gallons even if you're being conservative on a small sink. That means you have two minutes of running the water to rinse the dishes, assuming you don't pre-rinse or have any need to top off the basin, before you're using as much water as the dishwasher. There's definitely a tipping point for loading in too few dishes for the dishwasher to be worth it but most people understand that a single plate would be a waste.
Did you watch this video, and are frustrated because you live in a place without a dishwasher, or without a place to even install one? Look up a countertop dishwasher! I got a Faberware personally. It requires no installation, fits on my counter without issue, takes maybe 5 minutes to load, and saves me many hours every week. I used to have no choice but to hand-wash for 10 years, and I hated it. Getting a countertop dishwasher was a game-changer. It was literally one of the best purchases I've ever made.
I would love one if I had the counter space for it
Same I can only recommend it it's the highlight of my kitchen 😂😂
.
Do you have space for a roll-away dishwasher?
Dozens of hours per week seems like a sliiiight overexaggeration
1. To fully compare efficiency, also compare the amount of labor involved. The main reason why people buy dishwashers is to reduce the time spent on a repetitive & boring chore. I wanted to write "You had me at time-saving" but it wasn't mentioned.
2. It would help some of us if you also compare older dishwashers, not just "modern." I think mine is 50 years old. It doesn't heat the water, and the hot water supply in the building is set at about 125ºF. Perhaps MinuteFood should do a video about whether to replace an old dishwasher (that isn't broken).
In your case, the water isn't hot enough, so it won't be very effective. If it has the heating element and it's broken, fix it, if it doesn't have, a tabletop dishwasher or getting an electric hot faucet and use that water instead are options. Or buy a new dishwasher and sell yours for someone with very hot hot water.
125F, is about 52C, UK dishwashers run between 51 & 60C, so 52C should be do able, maybe not ideal but useable.
Worth checking that the water is running hot before running the dishwasher, ie if the hot feed is next to your hot tap (faucet), run that 'til it's running hot, then start you dishwasher.
If your dishwasher is 50 years old (although I doubt that, as the chances of it not needing replacing due to breaking or whatever are very slim) then I would highly recommend replacing it. Technology has improved, safety standards have improved, a newer dishwasher will clean dishes much better, and will likely use much less water and energy due to more modern energy and water saving methods.
>NaThingSerious : On the other hand, a rule of thumb is to not replace large appliances that still work. Besides the obvious time & money costs to research, buy & install a new unit and to dispose of the old unit, manufacturing processes consume resources and generate pollution. Also, newer appliances tend to break down more quickly because they're not built to last.
@@brothermine2292 I tend to agree, if it does what you need/want, probably no need to change.
If its not doing what you want/need, can it be made to do that?
If so at what cost?
Having said that, if you look at older cars, for instance, newer cars tend to give much better comfort, safer drive, safer in accidents, these happen even if not your fault, cheaper to run. Sometimes it is worth considering an upgrade.
Re new stuff being not built to last, I think it is worse I think it is often built not to last.
Washing machines are very simple machines really.
Things worth noting. It’s worth scraping solid foods off, but you don’t need to pre-rinse in the sink before going into dishwasher. ALSO, not all things SHOULD go in a dishwasher: certain plastics that deform in high heat, wood utensils that can be ruptured from the high heat, and vacuum sealed containers may not hold their vacuum. SO, THOSE items should be hand-washed just before you run the dishwasher to allow the water to warm up before running the dishwasher.
ALSO, on a similar note, I LOVE that this video spoke out about the germ /water temperature while hand washing topic; “washing water with extremely hot water” to kill the germs is sooooo wrong - just use water warm enough that it feels comfortable for you hand - you will NEVER want to warm the water up enough to the point that the hotness kills germs, at that point you are scalding you are hand.
This really irritates me! People have told me before that water isn't hot enough, and every time I'm just thinking "do you WANT me to burn myself?"
Meanwhile I'm here shocked that people have hot waters in their taps. Where I live taps are almost always cold water only
One added benefit is that the dishwasher CAN get up to not just your taps max temp, but even heat it up further to even indeed reach sanitizing temps
@@cherriberri8373 oh absolutely, partly what I was trying to get at.
@@derp4581 That's an infrastructure issue, nobody wants the expense of retrofitting pipes for the hot water.
1:42 use powdered detergent, that way you can also have detergent during the pre wash making your dish washer even more effective!
I'm generally pro-dishwasher, but I feel the need to point out that sanitizing is not the same as cleaning. There are times when the dishes may be sanitized (from long exposure to hot water), but not clean (from crusted on food). The fact that sometimes dishes may come out not completely clean, even if they are sanitized, is a major component of feeling like dishwashers are inefficient.
This all the way. If you are doing real cooking, and end up with crusty pots and pans, you can’t just throw them in the dishwasher and walk away. You have to stand there and scrub the crap out of them repeatedly until they are clean of crud, and at that point where they’re ready to go in the dishwasher, they’re basically done anyway. If someone is happy with the results of their dishwasher, I’m convinced they don’t cook. They’re just sticking something on a plate.
But if you actually cook, the dishwasher is not saving you any time, because you have to stand there washing only to have the dishwasher wash it again.
Now, the sanitizing power of hot water is a valid point, and probably the only convincing argument in this video. If we change the name of a dishwasher to dish sanitizer, I could probably get behind it. And this is probably the crux of the pushback. If you the thing does not *wash* your dishes, then it is not a dishwasher.
When it can scrape the crud off of grandma’s turkey pan the day after Thanksgiving, it will be a dishwasher. Until then it is a dish sanitizer.
Just soak them in water for an hour, crust gone.
@@gongcyclist Sounds like this depends on the type of cooking and cookware though. I've cooked with pots and pans and even though the dishwasher can't reliably get rid of all the food crust, it's still a very useful tool. Here's why:
1) It almost always works reliably on dishes
2) For cookware, you might want to manually pre-wash and judge with your personal experience. For me, it's still faster to quickly scrub off big chunks of crust and then load it into the dishwasher, than to do everything manually to the end. If you have like 5 pots from a big meal, going all the way to completely clean for each piece might take you several additional minutes. So much easier to scrape off big crusts and leave the rest to the machine.
3) In my experience, even if a pot comes out of the machine with food crust still on it, it's wayyy easier to remove than trying to scrub it off before you put it into the dishwasher. The dishwasher seems to soften it up and remove large areas of crust; the remaining bits are small pieces that are easily wiped off manually. This probably has to do with the much higher water temperature you get from doing it with the machine first, and several hours of detergent exposure. It's like soaking your pots before washing, but even better!
Which they all will do at some point.
@@gongcyclist If you cook, you ought to learn some cooking techniques that will greatly reduce the cleaning you have to do. For instance, you can make a gravy with the drippings in that roasting pan, which will basically clean the pan in the process (the leftover gravy can easily be rinsed out by a dishwasher). Pan sauces in general serve the same purpose. For baking, lining things with parchment paper is often a good way to keep the food from sticking to the pan. Maybe not everything you want to cook will make your dishes easy to clean, but you can have a pretty full repertoire of dishes which do.
Ok, ok... you win. I'll get my dishwasher serviced and I'll try it out. The hot water and long time arguments finally convinced me to at least try.
Once you actually start using it, you'll be baffled by how much time was wasted staring off into space scrubbing dishes.
If it can’t be repaired, they are not terribly difficult to install from new. I couldn’t afford any of the quotes from plumbers, so I looked up some TH-cam videos and read the instructions. There’s generally 4 steps. Add a water supply, add a drain, add power cable, and put it in place. I only needed an adjustable wrench, a Philips head screw driver and a flathead screwdriver for my own and a drill bit. After doing mine I did another for my girlfriend’s house and that one only needed a 1/4 hex nut driver instead of a flathead.
I also wasn’t able to turn off the main water supply to get a different valve for the dishwasher, so I added a T fitting so both the sink water and the dishwasher supply are operated by the same valve
And it saves water.
@@johnbradwell3834 In my country the installer has to be certified for insurance companies to pay up if water damage occurs from it
I recommend watching @TechnologyConnections videos on the dishwasher as well. Wealth of knowledge over there
I know she said it's okay not to own a dishwasher, but now I feel bad 😂 I feel like sending this to my landlord
If your landlord pays utilities, maybe you should do it! Don't if your home is owned or managed by a corporation, but if you're one of the few folks out there acquainted with a chill landlord, it could be good for both of ya'll
There are also those countertop dishwashers that don't require much for setting up though they can't fit many dishes as a traditional one.
Please note that in the infographic that describes the cycles of the dishwasher, it's clear that _detergent pacs are useless in the prewash_. USE POWDER/GEL DETERGENT and put some in the prewash compartment!
Someone watches Technology Connections
@@doxielain2231 I mean, yeah, obviously. But more importantly I LISTENED to technology connections and started having way more success with my dishwasher:P
Many modern dish washers don’t have a pre wash compartment. But you can just throw a bit of powder wherever in the bottom of the dishwasher.
*if you need to
for some people, living in some places, with some dishwashers, and some dirty dishes, prewash is unnecessary. for others, it's helpful. everyone should try it out, but you may not need it
Just use powder for everything. The tablets are just worse in every way, just look pretty.
(speaking for Europe) every dishwasher my family has ever had had a half-load button for when it got stinky and needed to be washed before fully loaded. That tips the efficiency even more towards dishwashers.
I do use a dishwasher because it's convenient, but the water comparison studies are just ridiculous. Even the lowest number 30l is a lot of water for doing dishes. And 447 liter?! Do they do the dishes in bath?
Really, my biggest reason for pre-rinsing isn't because it cleans dishes better per se, but because a dish might sit in the dishwasher for several days before the dishwasher gets full enough to run. Any crumbs or food residue on those dishes in that time just sit there rotting, or worse, attracting bugs. I have actually had ants infest my dishwasher before. Get this, just running the dishwasher does next to nothing to get rid of ants.
So it's not about cleaning the dishes better, it's about preventing food from being left out.
I wonder how they get in. It should be water tight. The smell when you open it alone keeps me pre-rinsing.
why not just run a half load on your dishwasher?
it would still save more water than pre rinsing
You might need to train the ants better, I find that if I give them a little treat on the floor they don't jump up on the counter as much …
@@jakebocaj The more efficient method would depend heavily on the half-load size and the time spent pre-rinsing. However, you are probably right that running smaller, more frequent loads would be more efficient in the end.
lol @test74088
But there are times when stains are made out of substances that don't dissolve well in water where a brush is much better at removing it, and putting it in the dishwasher won't remove everything properly.
This! This video moved to goalpost so much to what we don't care about: number of bacteria. The bacteria may be dead, but there's mineral deposits and soap residues on my dishes which smell awful. I always hand-rinse and scrub my dishes after they've come out of the dish washer. A solid brushing/rubbing (even with just the hands) can just not be matched by spraying some water.
@@mistersir3020 If there is soap residue on there, you probably use too much detergent. If you use a powder detergent, try putting less in and see if it helps
If you're using pods or other forms of pre portioned detergent, try to find powder, it is cheaper and superior lol
@@MissNoechen Will try but we also have very hard water over here
@@mistersir3020also don’t pre rinse dishes: it leaves less stuff for the soap to latch on and you will get streaks. For hardwater there should be different settings regarding how much salt is used. Don’t skip the salt! Super important.
@@giobaldu I don't pre-rinse and the water is softened. Still and all, there's clearly a residu left after a washing machine cycle. I don't give a turd about how many bacteria are on there; I just want my dishes to not have a smell, my food to not absorb a residu from the washing machine. The number of bacteria is entirely inconsequential, nobody ever died from ingesting some stupid bacteria - they all die in the stomach anyway.
I was supervisor of a dish room at a university. We had THOUSANDS of dishes. Sometimes up to a thousand students at once. I hate dishwashing now. I use the dishwasher whenever possible.
Edit: Okay it wasn't thousands at once but it sure was after being rotated on busy days. Every night at closing it was a few hundred plates, bowls, cups, pans etc.
Wow, I can't even imagine washing a thousand dishes in one go. I'd probably hate dishwashing even with a dishwasher if I had to do a thousand dishes.
To me, your statements sounds similar to this: I was responsible for moving items between offices. The offices are miles apart. Sometimes, I have to go a hundred miles between the two offices. I hate moving things between offices now. I use the car whenever possible instead of walking.
It's actually blowing my mind that some people have a dishwasher and never use it, and even more so that they are proud and happy of that fact! I suppose if they have a truly ancient slumlord model it makes sense, but other than that, what a wild thing.
Yeah, it's very silly and spoiled. I went from a house with a dishwasher to one without, and it was awful.
Some people like the peace of mind that hand washing brings. That said, there’s no right answer either way. To each their own.
I enjoy washing the dishes by hand. There’s a meditative quality to the experience. Invariably there are dishes that don’t do well in the dishwasher as well, wooden items and most non-butter knives don’t do well in the dishwasher. It’s also considerably faster to do them by hand allowing for the kitchen to be done in short order. I still use the dishwasher for the bulk of things, but rarely a day goes by that hand washing isn’t also done.
So if you were single, would you run the dishwasher for half a dozen dishes, or just let dirty dishes sit around for a week until the dishwasher was full? I hope you enjoy roaches.
@azraphon what peace of mind? What peace is there to be gained?
as a non-dishwasher owner (and a very dishwasher wisher, but never living an apartment that has one) this is painful to watch.
Right ...most people don't have a dishwasher. What are we supposed to do lol. We good tho because otherwise we would have been ill already.
There are small dishwashers available that you can place on your counter, they're also marketed for camping. I have some issues with my hands which made it very painful for me to do dishes so I had to buy one of those and it made my life so much better
@@Snufaay you're largely overestimating newer generations' housing situation. And the few ones that for some miracle have the space for a small one, well, good luck telling the landlord and getting it approved.
@@mattia_carciola I never estimated anybody's counter space at all. Just tried to share the information to others who might need it. I didn't know until last year that there are dishwashers available which are no different from a microwave in size and handling. You place it next to your kitchen sink, with a lose pipe hanging into the sink for the dirty water. I fill the dishwasher by hand from the top, each time before I run it. It's nothing my landlord had to approve since it's not really installed into the kitchen at all. I admit I have a bit more counterspace than my friend who had informed me about the existence of these machines, but she also had one and her "kitchen" in her super tiny apartment was among the smallest kitchen solutions I have ever seen, no counters at all. I know small living spaces and I do know younger generations, I'm not that old myself. I guess it also helps that I do not own a microwave, like I said the dishwasher doesn't need any more room than a microwave
@@mattia_carciola why would you need landlord approval for a countertop appliance that isn’t plumbed in? Does your apartment have a shared kitchen?
I have to pre-rinse because my dishwasher is one of the smaller portable ones. it doesn't have a connection to the water line so it can't do its own pre rinse cycle
Our dishwasher was broken for a week a bit ago, and the amount of additional time and drying space we had to spend washing dishes (in addition to the usual handwash only/too big for dishwasher items) for a family + pets was insane. Time is money, and dishwashers save so so much working time.
To me the greatest advantage of finally getting a dishwasher was not the cleanliness or energy use, but how much TIME it saved me! That beats all other considerations. But I did notice the glasses looked even cleaner than when I hand washed them. I do still was casseroles by hand though, as the dishwasher would otherwise fill too quickly or I may need it the next day too. I takes me 6 days to fill a load.
I trust my dishwasher to disinfect the dishes, but it doesn't remove stuck-on cheese, among other things, no matter how neatly the dishes are placed, so I will keep pre-scrubbing until I get a better dishwasher.
Does pre-soaking work? (Easier than scrubbing.)
Do you use pre wash detergent? Every dishwasher is designed to use two doses of detergent, for its two main cycles. The pre wash cycle water gets drained pretty quickly because its the first to go and its the cycle that deals with dishes that are the most dirty. If you dont put detergent in for that cycle, the cycle essentially just gets the dishes wet. Also check to make sure that the water coming from your kitchen sink is hot before turning on the dish washer. If it isnt, whenbyou turn it on the pre wash cycle will be washing with cold water.
Do both of these things. Put in some detergent just at the bottom of the dishwasher, literally just throw some in there and then run the sink hot. This will make sure that the pre wash cycle is using hot soapy water instead of cold non-soapy water like its probably been doing. Once the prewash cycle water is drained, the main wash will only have to deal with somewhat dirty dishes and will have a lot more soap to wash them with.
@@brothermine2292 It depends on the foodstuff in question. Generally, no, not to the point that a dishwasher alone will remove it. Soaking can drastically reduce the amount of scrubbing necessary to remove it, though. Cheese, baked goods, anything involving egg can be really obnoxious to remove, especially if you are _cooking_ rather than warming something on a bowl/plate. I spent a year as a dishwasher and eggs and bacon sheets were by far my least favorite things to clean.
Are people leaving their faucet open when washing dishes?
Usually not, but people often fill up the sink with two or more gallons of water. You couple that with the water used for rinsing and it comes out to a surprising amount of water. Couple that with the more frequent washing (most people with a dishwasher don’t run it every day), and the VAST majority of households would greatly benefit from a dishwasher from an efficiency standpoint. This doesn’t even take into count the hygienic advantages of dishwashers.
@KrisOsterhout
Hygienicly and time efficiency dishwasher wins hands down
Hand washing you dont need to rinse your dishes you can quite comfortably do a full load of dishes with 5 or 10 liters.
Plus using a dishwasher some things cant be put through it so you will have to hand wash anyways adding to your water usage.
Im traveling at the moment so i am pretty water conscious and i use less than 150L a month and that drinking and showering too.
Hand washing is more water efficient if you have the time.
This helps my audhd tremendously. I am now armed with the information needed to proceed with using the dishwasher in most cases
Is that slang for autism and adhd
@@XxZeldaxXXxLinkxXyes
I didn't use a dishwasher for a long time until I looked into the research myself about 8 years ago. I don't prerinse anymore after a second look into the research, but I do prescrub certain kinds of foods before I put dishes in the washer because the dishwasher inevitably will fail to dislodge it. I'm glad that using the device is both more efficient and effective overall and only wish all the cookware and non-dishwasher safe items could also be tossed in there. 😛
I honestly couldn't care less about the bacteria. My problem with dishwashers is that they can leave your dishes poorly rinsed and with detergent residues, and because dishwasher detergent produces no foam, you can barely tell if it's there, so you just eat it all up
I'm afraid to put this thought out there ... Recently I had the thought and wondered how much microplastics we put into the environment with the favorite sponge we all use and that you showed. I used the brown natural ones they had before but are no longer available.
Great cast iron tee.
Trying to be environmentally conscious is sometimes worse for the environment. Those "brown natural" sponges might have been made from sea sponges, which were nearly overfished to extinction.
And the fishing could have contributed more carbon emissions than the manufacture of plastic sponges, similar to how a cotton shopping bag creates hundreds of times more carbon emissions than a single-use plastic bag, so you have to use it for years before it's beneficial for the environment.
I'm not saying that plastic sponges are great for the environment either, but these things are never as simple as they seem at first. I'm only guessing, but maybe a luffa (sponge gourd) would be the most environmentally-friendly option?
You can get dish washing sponges that are made from Cellulose. They're a bit more pricey, though, unfortunately. Mine are by the brand Spontex.
The catch here is that dishwashers are going to completely blow handwashing out of the water for removal of pathogens, but handwashing will be better for at least some forms of caked on dirt, and the latter is what is visible and generally judged as clean vs dirty day to day. It's an increasingly small difference, particularly when you mix in all the mistakes people make that are easily fixed to get better performance here, but it could explain why people *perceive* handwashing as better.
Yeah, but the nice thing about using the machine for everything by default is that exposes those few cases where you do need to put in some extra effort, so that you can expend that effort WAY more economically.
Instead of hand scrubbing every single bowl you ever use on the off chance that the dishwasher might not be able to clean it, you see a little crud that you need to scrape off with a fingernail and a brush once a month or so. Seconds of manual effort vs hours.
Refusing to use a dishwasher and washing everything by hand because it sometimes leaves on gunk is like refusing to vacuum and rug-doctoring your floors every week because it doesn't pick up stains.
Especially when the bacteria that they're referring to are not necessarily pathogenic
@@icedragon769 I'm personally a pretty happy regular dishwasher user, I'm more saying that this results in some people misjudging how clean the dishes are between the 2 options
Definitely. I mean if it's the heat that's killing the bacteria, I suspect handwashing and using the oven like an autoclave would be better. Seeing how the water and the soap are used, I just can't find comfort in letting it do the washing part. After all, it relies on the heating part to beat handwashing. A better comparison would be dishwasher minus the heat vs. handwashing.
@@acctsys Well, in fairness, the options in practice are handwashing vs hot dishwasher, and the main goal is really to render the dishes food safe for reuse, so the dishwasher is more fit for purpose, it's just that people are used to judging them by visible dirt so it creates the appearance of handwashing being better.
Handwashing and oven baking probably would be more effective, but not by much, and handwashing alone is already a lot more resource and time intensive than a dishwasher, it would be even worse if you then baked all your dishes for an hour afterwards
1:13 ooh, i love the ripples animation showing where to click the link for the previous video! It's like a UI/UX for a video game design!
The problem with the cleanliness studies is the endpoint. No one is swabbing their dishes at home and sending them for bacterial cultures to judge if they are "clean". People judge cleanliness by food residual left on dishes. If the dishwasher always leaves some food stuck on, people are not going to consider it clean. Therefore they will hand wash instead to make sure they can directly remove any bits of food.
My dishwasher very rarely leaves any pieces of food stuck to it. When it does, I simply remove it by hand knowing that it’s still a clean dish because of how hot the water got.
@ thanks for your anecdote but not everyone has a dishwasher like yours
@@LDogSmiles Facts. My brother ALSO claims his dishes from his dishwasher are clean...... No.... No, they are not... If I pick up a Pyrex bowl and it still has a greasy film on it after coming out of the dishwasher..... It's not clean...
@@sectorcodecits annoying to use though when you know theres gonna be a small chance every dish you use still has some food residue caked on because you used a dishwasher
@@sectorcodecalso how is it clean? If it still has food residue on it, whats stopping bacteria from growing again
This is one of your best videos so far, congratulations!
Quite solid research, answers the unaddressed questions from the previous video (which is the biggest point), and it has great visuals and sounds
I watched your last video and decided to experiment. You were right! Thank you for so many hours saved!!
This is the content I prefer on TH-cam, shot and informative
I'm very meticulous when washing dishes. I use really hot water and am very thorough, so I'm probably at least competitive with a dishwasher when it comes to cleanliness... but I'm also pretty slow at washing dishes. If you are as thorough as you need to be when hand washing, you are going to be far far slower than a dishwasher.
The idea that some people have dishwashers but refuse to use them is mind blowing. I HATE washing dishes by hand. I would gladly put one in my apartment if I could.
It would have been nice a comparison about the use of soap / detergent
I've had access to a Dishwasher for the last decade of my life and I haven't used it at all, due to two reasons:
- Bachelor life meaning I only use a small handful of dishes/tableware
- Owning a low number of dishes in the first place
I feel like the best use of a Dishwasher is when you use a lot of dishes and you own a lot of dishes to cycle through. It's hard for me to justify using the Dishwasher when I only really use one dish and one fork at a time.
However, I imagine the situation will change when a family is involved. Two people plus a child is going to generate a lot of dishes (and will need to own a lot of dishes in the first place).
Good to know dishwashers are efficient and effective!
I'm in pretty much the same situation as you. I lived in an apartment without a dish washer for a few years, and pretty much just washed and reused the same two plates and bowls over and over. The rest of the set just sat in the cubbord. Now that I have a dishwasher though, I just slowly fill it throughout the week and run it once I've use the last plate, bowl, or fork etc. I bought a cheap dish set forever ago that has 8 of everything. It's not enough to fill the dishwasher, but I'm only running it once or twice a week.
One of the most common dishes, are in fact pots and pans, used daily for cooking at home. Sooo, the more you like to cook, especially when you like variety; it also adds up.
Having a partner, or even a roommate or two who cook, seriously makes it worthwhile. Saves on food cost too- though, nothing beats cheap ramen, or cooked beans for cost (definitely eat the beans; much healthier, and more filling. )
At any rate, just cooking for yourself even, you probably don't need a washer. Definitely nice to have though! The countertop one another comment suggested is likely a great investment of you get more living mates!
Love and Peace folks, best of luck in your pursuits ❤
When i first got a dishwasher I was making much better meals for myself because I didn't have to wash up
If I'm left on my own for a couple of weeks, it takes about 3 days to generate enough dishes to run the dishwasher. I don't change what I'm cooking or the amounts, I just put more away in the fridge. The bulk of the load ends up being the pots from the cooking and larger containers used for leftovers, with the plates and glasses being a minority.
At the house where I have lived most of my life, none of the dishwashers we've had (we've had several of them) have been very good at cleaning dishes so we ALWAYS have to wash off every little spec of grime from the dishes before we load the dishwasher otherwise the dishes end up even dirtier once they get out of the dishwasher.
So glad to see part 2 of this series! Your research and the papers you cited were very informative for me, and the animations are engaging as hell. Keep it up!
My mom once said nobody in their right mind likes doing dishes and since I approved, it became my test to potential partners. These people in America boggle my mind, how are they so proud about it? Out of all people. The only reason to not use dishwasher is if you're stay at home parent priding yourself for doing unnecessary chores to fill the day, or if you have pans or other things that can't be put in the dishwashing machine. Washing dishes by hand as a student for 14 years has been some of the most miserable parts of my life. I got dishwashing machine at some point but had to move in a place that has too little room to remove a cupboard for dishwashing machine and it's expensive to install because it has to be made by a professional to apply for insurance. Actually they just turn the water valve, you have to pay more for them to install it, you have to install it and pay for them to turn the valve.
I don't know anyone who trusts their dishwashing machine so much that they wouldn't pre-rinse. Even with pre-rinsing you can sometimes find food scraps on the dishes. I guess "not necessary" is everyone's subjective experience.
Dishwashers serve no practical purpose for me.
All they clean is plates, bowls, spoons cups, etc.
Which are all dishes used to eat the food.
We all wash our own plates and spoons as soon as we eat. And it's very hard either
On an average day, most difficult dishes ro wash are the ones used for cooking, tye grinder, the mixer, the cutting plate. Grating board. Big pots with burned food inside them etc.
None if which can be fit in dishwasher...
I wonder about the energy consumption if one takes into account the energy required to manufacture and ship dishwashers?
Compared to the continuous energy usage in heating water, still much less than handwashing
A fellow Knork Silverware enjoyer
Not the youtuber I expected to see, yet one I welcome wholeheartedly ❤
HECK yes - they're the best!
don't pre-rinse dishes, pre-scrub them with a tiny amount of water (no soap needed) to get rid of any chunks that won't come off easily. Takes minimal effort and water, and means the dishwasher will never leave any dirt on dishes.
Even if the dishwasher used 5x the energy, freeing up the time is always worth it
Theres an issue of cleaning vs. Sterilization
Most dishwashers cannot remove tougher bits that instead bake on and stay adheered. That requires human intervention. The temp may be way higher in a dishwasher, but a human can apply much more pressure in the place its needed to remove debris (hard scrubbing).
Dishwashers are great sterilizers, not always great cleaners
Something worth mentioning, bacteria doesn't mean bad or dirty. Biodiversity is very important (for many things including your gut health). And ingesting soap is very bad so make sure to rinse your dishes properly if you hand wash
In My hostel most longterm guests do not wash dishes at home and it shows, i found greassy plates, coffe and tea stained glasses, they definetly dont wash dishes from all sides, they dont use sponges and rarely they use dish soap. So after our guests leave we have to wash dishes again so we use dishwasher, we have to clean cabinets and drawers too, even dishes that were not in use because they magically get mixed with dirty ones. I will sound like someones mom but like... Idk if i wash my dishes i do it on the bottom side as well because eventually they get stacked on a pile in a cabinet
This is a reoccurring problem in food service too. I'm convinced some of these people have never washed a dish in their lives
Good modern 60 cm dishwasher (Europe) uses
hell yeah dude hit em with the math
It only makes no sense to not use a dishwasher if you have enough dishes that need cleaning. Not only do I live alone, I use a pretty small set of dishes daily: two plastic bowls, a multicooker bowl/pan, a tablespoon, a teaspoon, a fork, a mug, and a knife. Plastic dishes and knives are recommended against being put in a dishwasher, the former can deform because of the heat, and the latter can get dull; the multicooker pan will probably not even fit in one, and I'm sure it's not allowed to go in it either. I have literally zero reason to buy a dishwasher for two spoons, a fork, and a mug.
@@Lernos1 Well in that case:
1. Buy a real set of dishes and fill up dishwasher once every couple days.
2. Knives don't go dull in dishwasher - this warning is either from knives having untreated wooden handles that get damaged by water or weird japanese knives made of iron/carbon steel that rust easily.
There is literally nothing else contacting knife than hot water solution with detergent soluable dirt.
Or buy a mini dishwasher - they're still more cost effective than handwashing.
@@michahalczuk9071 Why would I buy a set I'm not going to use? I've been at it for 7 years. Sounds like inventing new problems to me. Second, are you sure a dishwasher is still more cost effective than less than 4 minutes of water running (I don't leave my tap open all the time duh), especially considering that hot water doesn't use electricity on its own (piped directly in), unlike a dishwasher, and electricity is more costly than hot water where I live?
@@Lernos1 4 minutes of running hot water is waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay more than any dishwasher would use.
Even including the detergent and running power, it's still going to be much more cost effective unless you count your time as genuinely worthless.
For environmental purposes thought, the amount of energy and water used to build the dishwasher should be considered (like a lifecycle assessment). I think there are some studies on that, and it gives some points to handwashing.
You got Technology Connection's recent video in the description. GJ.
I love Alec's peculiar obsessions.
And yours too.
Very nice video! I do not currently own a dishwasher, but have in the past and wondered about the efficiency. I think that with a bit of care it is possible to defeat the machines ^^ Of course, my case is perhaps special... Firstly, dish-washing is a relaxing activity for me, which I do while catching up with podcasts or chatting with my family. Secondly, we're a small family, and do not own enough dishes to fill a machine; thirdly, I only ever use hot water for dish washing for a few weeks in the year, and I do dishes in two rounds (see below). I am definitely checking your tips in the future, keep up the great work!
My dish-washing strategy: first with a small sprayer, I get dishes slightly wet, then scrub solid residue (with my fingers, not a sponge). This is done over the main pan which I will wash later, so that any collected water helps soak it. Similarly, I clean things in batches, first soaping a few items, then rinsing the batch (over the remaining dishes, so that the soap contributes to the soaking of whatever items are next). I think typically the tap stays open for about 4 minutes as you mention, but I ought to measure that to be sure! Finally, I often eat out of the pan, so as to have one plate less to clean (but I guess "using fewer dishes" counts only partially as dish-washing strategy haha).
If this is the case when why do I keep having dried on food still stuck to my plates from the dishwasher? I don't think this takes into account people who only wash dishes once per week. We don't create enough dishes to run the dishwasher more than that. Most days, we accumulate 0 plates
Sounds like you have an old dishwasher and you're letting food dry. Put used dishes in the sink with water in them until you're ready to load and start right away. My dishwasher pump was failing and this happened to me. Then I threw it out and bought a Bosch. No problems since.
Are you using gel packs? Add a bit of powder detergent in for the rinse cycle. Also run the water hot before starting, Top tips from Technology Connections vid and the results are night and day.
@@gladitsnotme yeah food dries because if we leave it in a filled sink for 4-5 days it starts to smell. Otherwise we're right back at pre-rinsing, right? This dishwasher isn't that old, maybe 5 years
@@MaxPower417 using those Cascade (maybe not that brand) dishwashing packs, yea. Where would you add powder detergent? In the same opening as the packet, just pour some at the bottom then toss it on top?
@@Boombocks_Studio when you close the little door/cap with the pod you should see there is a little depression on top and that’s where you can put a little powder/gel. It’s specifically for the rinse cycle, where right now you are using just water because the door with the detergent doesn’t pop open until after the rinse.
what i would be interested in is what happens when you factor in dishwasher malfunction (mine was having trouble drawing water properly the other day and that often means that one or two loads end up not properly cleaned and you can't just run the thing again in those cases) and generally instances where you have to do some secondary handwashing (pots and pans sometimes don't get properly clean and again, this is dried gunk, you can just run it again)
Every time I see a "dishwashers are more efficient than hand washing" claim, I'm reminded that a lot of people hand wash like lunatics... Every house and apartment I've lived in in Australia has a dual sink, you 1/3 fill one with soapy water and 1/3 fill the other with clean rinse water, and you can usually get through more than a dishwasher can.
Dishwashers are great because of labour saving, but they're only more water efficient than the most deranged way of wasting water while doing the dishes.
Most people don't have dual sinks, and most people enjoy rinsing their dishes properly instead of eating soap residue from 30 other dishes.
@@gladitsnotme then rinse in a bucket next to the sink? And don't give me that soap residue malarkey, dishwashers recycle the rinsing water too, and people are fine with using those
Can confirm. I used to do dishwashing as a job. Watching people wash dishes churns my stomach.
I am not concerned about bacteria. I don't put raw meat on my dishes. The problem with dish washer is the stuck on rice they can't wash out of without physical scrubbing. Another problem is the continuous use and wash in between dishes so I don't need a huge amount of them.
As someone who lives alone, I definitely spend less than 4 minutes washing dishes a day (not including pans that can't go in the dishwasher anyway), and certain dishes I wash, I need clean and ready for the next day. So my dishwasher is a glorified drying (and storage) rack. Only exception is I'll run it after hosting a dinner party or something where I have a large number of dishes to clean at once
Ditto! So I’m happy she touched on our use case in this video.
I have a small dishwasher and a good amount of dishes (the single tenant lifestyle is a lawless wasteland with no standards or conventions, so it's not easy to gauge how many dishes are "normal" for one person to own. But in my case, I have a few plates, a few bowls, a bunch of old glass containers/ jars I use as drinking glasses, some cups, a set of utensils etc etc etc). Which means I don't need to wash most dishes immediately for me to have some clean ones the next day. I can just load up my machine and run it once it's full (which is almost exactly when I've used up all my dishes), and repeat the cycle.
Now, even though I got the cheapest viable dishwasher available to me, I know that not everyone has the money, the space or some other capacity to get one. BUT THAT ASIDE THOUGH, I do not know of any good reason to not use dishwashers, even for people who live alone
Stainless steel and enameled pans can go into dishwasher no problem.
Tbh i think non stick would do there fine too, as long as you place them so they don't scratch on the pins
@@Ubeogesh I use carbon steel, you definitely cannot put carbon steel in the dishwasher or you strip your seasoning
Use the dishwasher often enough that its rubber hoses don't dry out and crack. (Assuming it has rubber hoses.)
We use a dishwasher at my house, but I've seen dishes come out of there with food still stuck on them one too many time, so I always give my dishes an extra hand wash at the sink before using them.
Watch tutorials, that shouldn't be happening.
Why do some dishes (especially plastics) have residual detergent fragrance after going through the dishwasher? Are there detergent/rinse aid residues on dishes?
Metal and Ceramic dishes are non-porous, plastic dishes are generally porous, so they will retain some of the cleaning chemicals
Sometimes. It really depends on which soaps you're using, how hot the water is, among other issues. If you have residue, consider switching soap to either a different brand, or a less concentrated formula for a little while and see what happens. As for the rinse aids, it SHOULDN'T leave residue, so if you're concerned that's what's causing it, I'd save testing the removal of that for last.
Two other tips! Make sure that the water in your dish washer is actually hot. Cold water circulating is less likely to get gunk off than hot water. Secondly, make sure you're not overloading your washer, or stacking dishes strangely. If some plates/bowls are overlapping, and water can't rinse that particular dish, then the residue is gonna stay there.
Putting plastic in dishwashers isn't recommended.
There was a big study on plastic water bottles in The Netherlands and it showed after 15 washes in a dishwasher it started to drop micro plastic. Which can't be healthy for you. Because they get to hot.
Besides that, non plastic silverware is usually more robust which leads in less waste.
Dishwashers don't make sense for me personally. My husband and I either use a very tiny number of dishes per day, in which case any food would be hard-baked on by the time we ran a load, OR we use a bunch of really big stuff all at once, which would be difficult to fit in the washer. Plus we have a lot of plastic bowls and lids that can't be super-heated and would need to be hand-washed anyway. Along with our glasses, which have designs on them that can't be super-heated. And our wooden utensils, which would be damaged by being super-heated.
We don't use sponges to wash our stuff - we use brushes. We let everything air-dry in a rack so it's not being dried with a towel (who has time for that?). And there is NO REASON to leave the water running the entire time you wash dishes. Of COURSE that wastes water. Turn the water on long enough to get the dishes and brush wet, then turn it off, and leave it off until you're ready to rinse everything off, using the rinse water from one thing to pre-rinse another. Yes, I know I still use more water than a dishwasher, but I would have to do that anyway because a lot of stuff we own has to be hand-washed.
But I'm too much of an edge-case to ever find representation in these kinds of videos. :\
The biggest difference: TIME.Washing dishes by hand simply takes a lot of time you can use for other things. When free time is already at a premium for you this begins to matter a lot.
This is why I use my dishwasher even for smaller loads. 5 coffee mugs, a popcorn bowl, some tumblers and a baking pan are my typical load and I know I'm saving water and time.
Ugh! Sure does. It's maybe 15 minutes to solve the puzzle of loading the dishwasher, and about 45 for the tedious chore of washing the same amount by hand.
I've done a 180 on dishwashers in the last 2 years. I always suspected that they could be better at cleaning than doing it by hand just from a chemical perspective: hotter water is better at cleaning, and the dishwasher tablets are probably formulated to be especially good at cleaning in hot water. But it's only when I started learning about HOW a dishwasher works, that I saw just how much more efficient it is than handwashing. So now it seems to tick all the boxes for me, when compared to by hand:
- Convenient
- Effective/hygienic
- Efficient/eco-friendly
Admittedly, I also understand that not all households have a dishwasher and that may be influenced by factors like wealth, where you live, etc. But for those of us who have a dishwasher, it's one of those things where the most convenient option is also the most environmentally friendly one (under most circumstances), where in most everyday areas it's the opposite.
Except cooked-on, or dried-on egg, that always stays on my dishes after the dishwasher.
What needs extra attention by hand before seems to be very model-dependent. Put a pan that had been used to do scrambled eggs in my previous dishwasher and it would only get half of it off. The new one seems to get it all. You really need to just do some experiments to find out the limitations of your machine, then give extra treatment to what it can't handle before putting it in.
I appreciate this video. I'd love to see clarification between the terms "clean" and "sanitize." 😊
I cannot imagine someone using 447 Litres to do the dishes by hand.
How?
That is like half a bathtub full.
I wish the video summarized the tips to improve handwashing since all the resources linked in the description are pay walled
I have a dishwasher at home, but my parents have never used it. The issue is that now we cannot use it even if we wanted to, because my parents have turned it into a storing space 😅
Which baffles me. At that point, why not just remove the dishwasher and build another cabinet?
The only thing that i haven't seen people actually compare - washing dishes with cold/cool water vs dishwasher.
I tend to simply use cold water for hand washing so there, i am definitely saving the electricity but wasting a lot of water. However, the overall cost would be lower in hand washing in thaf case since water is cheaper than electricity.
If there are hard chunk stains, they need pressure to be taken down, which dishwashers can't do. Moreover, my mom, who is diligent with cleaning, tried a dishwasher and dishes came out visibly dirty, so they only work for relatively clean dishes.
Dishwashers use chemicals in the detergent for this, combined with the hot water that rinses for a long period of time, this combination cleans almost anything. I have personally tested this with my own dishwasher and it effortlessly cleans even completely encrusted gunk that has been hardened and crusted for over 4 days on plates or pans, and even on knives with a small surface area, or spatulas that are dirty on both sides with crusted gunk at the edge of it. No matter what I put in, the machine cleaned it completely spotless to the point I almost didn't believe how effective this machine really is. I literally started putting things in thinking "Checkmate, there's no way THIS will come out spotless", but then it did...
Not only hard. Some cheeses, some fats, and pretty much anything egg is difficult for most _industrial-grade_ dishwashers with strong chemical treatments to remove.
I'm Indian and I put my dishwasher through trial by fire. After cooking curries and gravies, I scrape down food pieces/crusts and soak the dishes in water. This helps dislodge food pieces so dishes come out visibly clean. Wooden/sensitive utensils are hand washed.
At the cabin where we have to haul in the water, you'd be surprised at how little is needed if you do it with low water usage in mind. Sure the water is not super hot but then the rinse is done with water that was boiled at way hotter then 65. Done with no extra energy half of the year as your heating the cabin anyway.
Fun fact: my dishwasher saves rinse water to use as wash water next time.
And it has a separate Sanitize cycle that brings the water up to a really high temperature.
I loath emptying the dishwasher more then I do just doing the dishes so I just wash the dishes myself.
Those studies should really control for people who are insanely wasteful when hand washing dishes, I have a cousin that would wash and rinse the silverware one at a time with the water running the whole time.
Still have to scrub the dishes to remove most gunk before you load them in the dishwasher, not necessarily pre-rinse. Every dishwashing machine that I have ever used, commercial ones in fast food or home appliances, left lots of gunk on them if the dishes didn't get a fair scrub before hand, just a wet scrubber is needed.
use soap in the pre wash container (or just throw some extra soap in the tub outside of the soap compartment if your washer doesn’t have one) and run the tap hot before starting the dishwasher, trust me
Yeah...nope. not if you're using the dishwasher correctly. Watch the video by technology connections.
@@binglebongle8601 Dried on stuff on plates and other stuff, and wood utensils, they don't come off in the dishwasher. I run about 3 cups of water into a small dirty pot and then scrub them with a rough pad, loosens it up for the dishwasher. Have been using a dishwasher both professionally and at home for over 40 years, all the same story. The damn things don't scrub, they spray, and the pressure isn't high enough for many things.
@@kasey42 Did for a year, same. It would take a sizeable amount of _really_ aggressive chemicals to remove stuff like cheese and eggs.
This is for the most part what I had expected, but one thing, we don't let our tap run while we wash, we fill our sink ( which is probably like 6l max ) and then wash our dishes in that
I would _love_ to be able to do less handwashing! But my MiL's kitchen is _full_ of things that can't go in the dishwasher. Anything that comes with a nonstick coating, she chooses that in preference to anything sensible; cheap plastics that will melt; aluminums that will lose their finish; heirloom china where the pattern will wash off; pots and serving dishes that just plain won't fit... Plus, even in the new modern dishwasher, many of the heat-safe plastics cling to fats and _still_ come out with a soapy residue clinging to that.
Maybe you're using too much detergent then. Have you tried powder detergent with different amounts?
I'm Asian (and not living in a Western country) and we don't do dishwashers.
Also I cook and most expensive things can NOT go in a dishwasher. Glasses, knives, wooden stuff, fancy delicate china and custom crockery and teaware, you name it.
I'd use one in a heartbeat if I were a cheap restaurant dealing with generic white porcelain plates but that does not describe my household.
Get rid of kitchen items that can't go into the dishwasher. That was my mothers attitude way back. If it can't go in the dishwasher why have it?
@@jiahaotan696 Thats actually a common myth in non-Western countries, dishwashers can handle all those things. Glasses, knives, wooden stuff, even fancy delicate china and teaware. Dishwashers have different settings, much like laundry machines do, and you can choose the setting you want. Do you want it scrubbed hard? Sure. Do you want it delicate? Also fine. Do you want to do it with cold water? Its just a button away.
@@kennixox262 That's my attitude as well, but it's not my stuff, and I'm not arguing the point with somebody pushing 90 years old.
It blows my mind thst anyone wouldn't use a dishwasher. It is water hot enough to burn your fingers-obviously it cleans better.
I love to see that your merch partnership is with DFTBA! The rest of the video is, of course, also great, but I'm always thrilled to see more popularity go towards the endeavors of the Green brothers.
I’m a bit confused about the information on handwashing. I understand that high temperatures (like 60°C) can kill bacteria, which is important for dishwashing. However, I’ve also heard that washing hands with soap and warm water is effective because it physically removes bacteria and viruses, rather than killing them. Could you please clarify how these two pieces of information fit together?
I still agree, but compact living, rentals and office kitchen may not have a dishing machine.
Soap definitely disinfects by killing viruses and germs. In that regard, most soaps do a well enough job.
Here is a question. Who fonded those researches? Dishwasher makers?
References in the description, you can check yourself, funding has to be disclosed :)
Just wash the dishes right after you use them and you get most of these benefits. It's the absolute best habit I've developed. Unless you eat from 10 plates at a time, it takes about 5 seconds to wash almost any dish if you don't let the food dry on it
I am all in for using a dishwasher, but what about the environmental impact of dishwasher detergent? I guess it goes roughly along with the water usage (i.e. hand washing uses more water, hence also more soap), but how much more aggressive is dishwasher detergent than normal soap?
It should be around the same amount of impact as normal soap, but you're likely using less detergent in the dishwasher. Main thing about dishwasher detergent vs normal dish soap is that the dishwasher detergent just doesn't foam up.
If you are concerned though, consider using powder instead of something like a detergent pod. The pods can only be deployed during the wash cycle, so they're typically more powerful and more concentrated. Whereas the powder you can more easily choose how much detergent you add.
It depends on the choice of detergent. If you're using the powder or tablets, it probably contains bleach, which is not exactly a nice chemical to deal with, but it's mostly a problem for people with septic systems rather than municipal sewers. Septic systems are affected because they depend on bacterial activity to function, and bleach kills bacteria. In a municipal sewer, most of the bleach will break down into simple compounds like table salt and water, but there is evidence that a small portion may form chlorinated organic compounds, which could be carcinogenic in large enough quantities (more research is needed).
If you're using the goop, then there's probably no bleach in it, just soap (surfactants) and enzymes. I find it hard to believe that the enzymes used in dishwashing will survive wastewater treatment, but surfactants may have environmental effects. Those chemicals are also present in the powder and tablets, and some kind of surfactant will be present in basically any means of washing anything (dishes, clothes, hands, the body, etc.), so it's not as if this is avoidable (but maybe we can find surfactants that cause less harm).
As for hand-washing dish soap, you're likely to find surfactants and possibly something like lactic acid (to kill bacteria and/or descale surfaces), which again can have implications for septic systems if used in large enough quantities, but seems unlikely to cause broader environmental issues (lots of animals produce lactic acid naturally as part of their metabolism).
This is actually a good point. Especially with tablets and capsules... the soluble film they are wrapped in has a warning along the lines of "toxic to fish and aquatic life". Good thing there's no way for it to end up in natural water courses! (I'm British and that was sarcasm)
@@fuzziestlumpkin With regards to the toxicity, that's mostly in its pure, concentrated form. So basically, don't toss one of the pods in the river; if a fish eats that, it'll die. However, once the pod is in the wash, it completely breaks down in the water, and just lets all the soap out. That mixture will not only be extremely diluted, but will just be sent out with sewage anyway, to be processed later, so there's no real environmental impact any more than other types of soap.
I find there's always like pressed in gunk after a dishwasher cycle. Even if its technically sterilised, it just isn't something I'm gonna use without handwashing again myself.
I get that 'I'm not stacking right' or whatever, but I've not yet managed to get it right at all, especially cutlery.
Also, I just can't fit half the stuff I need washing in there so I have to mix between dishwasher and handwash anyway. Becomes more of an inconvenience overall. I've not gotten salmonella yet so seems handwashing is fine
It takes days for us to fill the dishwasher. Opening that thing when it's halfway full STINKS. We pre-rinse to avoid that.
How few times per day do you eat
Unfortunately people don't like this option and I understand why, but I designate a counter for dirty dishes and the dishes that sit inside my dishwasher are clean.
Dishes sitting on a counter get dry really quickly, which means they dont smell or attract insects. I live alone and go weeks in between cycles with no problems.
Another option is to buy a dishwasher with an air purifying system, such as the beko ionguard system, but I dont depend on it for dirty plates
It might still be more water effective to run the dishwasher more often, like when it's 1/3 to 1/2 full, than to pre rinse each dish and only running at full capacity
I never prerinse and I agree, sometimes stuff stinks. Leaving the door ajar greatly helps, also I use a napkin to remove food residue
I used to use my dishwasher all the time but I realize I use a lot of kitchenware that isn’t dishwasher safe throughout my cooking, (knives, nonstick pans, wooden utensils, wooden cutting boards) So i end up just doing everything myself and using the dish washer as a rack
Dishwasher is a lot less effort… so it wins 😂
Run the tap until it's hot before running the dishwasher! The dishwasher is connected to the hot water supply so if you actually supply it hot water and not water that's been sitting and chilling in pipes, you can actually get good cleaning out of it
HERE is how I hand-wash dishes:
I use a sponge with a nylon wrap thing around it to make it semi-abrasive. I DO NOT load the sink with water. I pre-rinse dishes then load the sponge with the new Palmolive With Oxiclean and about 25% ammonia. That combination cuts grease like a hot knife through butter. I stack up the soapy dishes on the sink, then rinse them with HOT as I can stand water. This works fantastically and I bet if they were examined they would be very close to germ-free. Two things that you said apply here: It ISN'T energy efficient and it takes time. The issue is, I don't have room for a dishwasher in my kitchen. 😨
I bet that you would still find that your dishes aren’t as clean as a dishwasher but probably far cleaner than the average hand wash. However, given that you don’t have room for a dishwasher, I’d say you’re doing the best possible cleaning you can.
get a counter top model
I first wet the dishes and wipe them with a sponge and detergent. During this process I don't leave the tap open all the time for this. Then I rinse the dishes under the tap. I use 3 - 5 L of hot water at most for ten dishes
Where did you get those figures
How to make me read the description and click on links in it: Bait me with extra efficiency
my 23 years old dishwasher just got replaced and i finally dont have to pre-rinse anymore
When i wash dishes by hand, i dump as many as i can in a tub filled with hot water, and let them sit for 1 minute, to then skrub em. Wouldent this way save more water, than continuously having the tab on?
You still need to rinse
If you reuse the water to rinse, then you're compromising in safety.
Even if you do use less water, it's probably not saving you a whole lot of money
For my rates, 1000 gallons = $4.40
Or 1 gallon = $.0044
Not a lot of savings
@@hector-m-carrillo *DO* you still need to rinse? The only items I rinse are glasses, to avoid soap spots. Anything else goes on the drying rack for some number of minutes before being hand dried. By then most of the water has dripped or evaporated off.
I see no evidence of anyone getting ill from the small amounts of bacteria on dishes, cutlery and crockery.
@@AthAthanasius soap is primarily a surfactant, meaning it works by wrapping dirt/bacteria/oil in bubbles.
This is important because a lot of things like to stick onto surfaces.
Soap does have antimicrobial properties - as in actively killing - but it primarily works through those bubbles.
medicine-yale-edu/news-article/why-soap-works/
Without rinsing, you are just letting everything that was trapped inside the bubbles free; which accomplishes very little. They could have gone down the drain instead.
This is then followed by you using a drying rag to clean the soap off, meaning your dish cloths are gathering bacteria significantly more quickly than the average.
We don't have a lot of data on how many people get sick from this because it's very hard to find out *where* someone got sick from.
But let's just assume the number of people who have gotten sick is >0.
Given that dishwashers are overwhelminglf more likely to be cleaner and cheaper, why would you risk those >0 persons with the worse alternative.
soap is primarily a surfactant, meaning it works by wrapping dirt/bacteria/oil in bubbles.
This is important because a lot of things like to stick onto surfaces.
Soap does have antimicrobial properties - as in actively killing - but it primarily works through those bubbles.
Google why soap works and go to the Yale link
Without rinsing, you are just letting everything that was trapped inside the bubbles free, which accomplishes very little; they could have gone down the drain instead.
This is then followed by you using a drying rag to clean the soap off, meaning your dish cloths are gathering bacteria significantly more quickly than the average.
We don't have a lot of data on how many people get sick from this because it's very hard to find out *where* someone got sick from.
But let's just assume the number of people who have gotten sick is >0.
Given that dishwashers are overwhelmingly more likely to be cleaner and cheaper, why would you risk those >0 persons with the worse alternative.
that tub alone is probably using almost as much (if not more) water as a dishwasher does
That is very interesting. I live in Brazil and we don't really use dishwashers that much. My dad owns a fairly modern one and he barely uses it in his household. Only when they have like A TON OF DISHES, like when they had ppl over, etc. Def not on day to day and I guess I kinda soaked that in. I never even considered a dishwasher.
Do we still need sterile dishes? I think we mostly look for gunk. My family's dishwasher us a bit unclear to use too...
the only dish detergent that gets dishes properly clean in my dishwasher leaves a slippery residue on the dishes after the cycle. i usually run the dishwasher a second time with some bleach to breakdown whatever that is. i suspect it's the rinse aid in it and i don't want to ingest chemicals.
Me: "Umm... these utensils are encrusted with dried-up bits of food, and all the glassware looks like a foggy day in London..."
The Dishwasher: "It's all perfectly sterile, I promise!"
Me: "That is not the issue!"
Hyperbole aside, I really don't care if there's some trace amounts of bacteria left on my hand-washed dishes. My immune-system needs the workout - an overly sterile life is how you wind up developing a ton of autoimmune conditions. The trouble just is that, if you live alone, you either run a dishwasher that's 5% full - which, even according to the rather optimistic numbers presented in this video, isn't very efficient - or you let stuff sit in the dishwasher for *days,* accumulating until it's sorta-kinda-full at least... at which point the gunk covering them will have dried up and become basically impossible for the machine to clean properly. So the results are either disgusting, or disgustingly wasteful.
"become basically impossible for the machine to clean properly" A classic example of underestimating your dishwasher, as most people do. The dishwasher will clean almost anything, even encrusted gunk on a pan that hasn't been washed for 3 days after using it. I didn't really believe this at first either, but then I just ran my dirty plates that had been sitting in the sink for 4 days with encrusted food scraps all over them through the dishwasher as a test, and they came out completely spotless and perfectly clean, even the most encrusted scraps were completely removed.
The only thing you have to be aware of is if you have a filter, and also if things are extremely oily, as oil can clog either the drain, or the water drainage pipe further downstream. For large amounts of oily residue, just use a paper towel to wipe the majority of it off, and you can put it into the machine just fine.
As for quantity of dishes, if you live alone, just learn to cook for yourself. You will be able to fill up a dishwasher more than enough to make it reasonably full after 2 days, and those two days that plates are sitting anywhere are not a problem for any dishwasher. Even then, modern dishwashers have different programs, shorter programs, half wash programs, and all kinds of options, so if you have a very small amount of dishes that you want done now, you can just run it on an alternate program and it will wash more efficiently than you would yourself.
Ooh and the glassware issue you have is because of hard water. You need to add water softener to the dishwasher, which completely eliminates this problem. Modern dishwashers have a special compartment for exactly this purpose, to add water softener and keep your glassware crystal clear. These issues you are having are simply because you do not know how to use a dishwasher, which is very common.
@@luka188 So... in order to avoid the minor inconvenience of hand-washing my dishes, I just need to... spend a ton more time and effort on more large-scale cooking-projects, on a daily basis, in order to generate enough pots, pans, plates and utensils to fill the dishwasher in a reasonable times?
Duly noted.
Adding a small amount of detergent in the pre rinse makes it so much better. Which is as simple as putting extra detergent on the door or in the pre rinse section
You should also be using less detergent in the main wash and getting some water softener if your glasses are getting foggy.
The issue with dishwashers are due to improper use. Using things the right way will allow you to get better results
@@FemmyFoxxo This is not a matter of improper use but people who do not really cook nor pay much attention talking down out of willful ignorance. There are a fair number of foodstuffs that dishwashers have difficulty removing. Detergent is not remotely adequate to remove some of the harder or more resilient residues if you have anything more than slightly dinner plates.
Something else worth mentioning is that, while a dishwasher is running, we're free to do anything else. Handwashing means we're tethered to the sink.
I find it odd that people purposefully don’t use their dishwasher but happily use their clothes-washing machine.
Because one offers convenience and the other doesn't. Is this really that hard of a question for you? Do you need to go back to grade school to learn basic rhetoric?
@@coroner2141 Maybe you should go back to school if you can't even see how both offer convenience, maybe also learn some manners while you are at it
Most countries don’t really use dryers
A lot of people misuse the dishwasher and attribute its failure to the machine and not their incorrect operation (not using pre-wash soap, not running the sink to remove cold water from the pipes before turning the dishwasher on, etc), a bunch of people also don't even try it, they hear from someone that it doesn't work so they don't even bother with it
@@coroner2141 what even are you trying to say? I'm going to assume you're implying dishwashers don't save time, which the video agrees with - the average dishwasher takes 2-4 hours to clean dishes. Until you realize that 'dishwasher time' is not 'your time', and you can do other stuff whilst the dishwasher chugs away.