"If you cook, I'll clean" may no longer be a fair trade in the kitchen anymore. That is, as long as you know the secret hacks of your dishwasher.
While washing dishes by hand likely takes you 15-20 minutes, putting everything in the dishwasher typically takes less than five — often spread out into quick moments — and saves space over a pile of waiting dishes. In fact, did you know that Energy Star estimates a dishwasher can save you over 230 hours (that's almost 10 days) of personal time over the course of a year?
Morgan Eberhard is a dishwasher scientist for Procter & Gamble (America's biggest dishwasher detergent manufacturer, led by Cascade), and she recently sat down with The Cool Down to show us just how much of a time-saver dishwashers are compared to the usual sudsy after-dining washing-by-hand routine.
Hands down, dishwashers are "the best way to get your dishes clean," Eberhard told us. "It uses the least amount of water and energy. … It's also more effective because the water does get hotter than you would be able to handle putting your hands in at the sink [and] that hot water is helping to do some of the cleaning."
Aspects like hot water tolerance aren't things we typically think about when comparing dishwashers to washing by hand, so Eberhard walked us through more of the hidden ways that these innovative — and often unsung — devices can help us save time and energy.
First up: You're not being 'lazy' by using your dishwasher
It's a myth that you ought to be hand-washing items to ensure you've put in enough elbow grease for an optimal clean. Instead, dishwashers are proven to save you money and reduce water usage compared to hand-washing. Lean into that.
"I've seen firsthand people who prefer to wash dishes by hand because they believe they can clean it better than the dishwasher," Eberhard told us. And then they "only clean the top side of the dish, and give it a rinse. … I'm like, 'Oh my gosh, you've forgotten 50% of the dish that was just stacked on other dishes!'"
By comparison, dishwashers can get into all the nooks and crannies of dishes, as well as crusty pots and pans (yes, it's OK to put almost all brands of these in the dishwasher too). Partly this is because of what we mentioned earlier: Dishwashers can boost water temperatures to 140 degrees for an extended period, allowing for better disinfection than what you can do by hand.
Next: The energy, time, and cash savings
Using your dishwasher adds up to real cost savings on your utility bills: over $130 per year.
How does that math out?
|
When do you typically wash your dishes? Click your choice to see results and speak your mind. |
Right after cooking 🍳 Hand-washing a typical load of dishes can use as much as two dozen gallons of water, but your Energy Star-certified dishwasher only uses about four gallons of water per cycle. Not to mention, dishwashers use about two times less energy to heat the water in the first place.
Less water and energy used = lower bills. That's always a bonus, especially as electricity bills are spiking across the country.
Best detergents to get the job done
Turns out, the detergent does matter. Not using the right formula is one of the main reasons that people end up dissatisfied with their dishwasher and resort to hand-washing again, Eberhard explained. And that, of course, increases water and energy use.
Eberhard noted that since 2009, there's been a 45% reduction in water and a 25% reduction in electricity for a normal dishwashing cycle (which, big picture, is a good thing). But as dishwashers evolve to use less water and energy, that means much more of the cleaning power is reliant on the detergent.
Grain of salt here is that P&G (where Eberhard works) could be said to benefit from people using dishwashers over hand-washing, as it means they're buying dishwasher detergent. But the company makes hand-washing dish liquid too, and as reported in previous TCD coverage, the people there said that most importantly, they want to help consumers to use less water as a way to make more sustainable choices.
Right now, roughly 70% of P&G's products use water, and in an increasingly water-scarce world where one-third of people live in water-stressed regions, that could theoretically threaten the future of P&G's business too.
The company recently launched a similar awareness campaign on the washing machine front, with a series of Tide ads encouraging people to trust their laundry to cold cycles much more often and noting that their brand has been tested to work well on cold, resulting in a win-win for wallets and the environment.
Back to the dishwasher front, Eberhard recommends checking out Cascade's Platinum Plus dishwasher packs, which incorporate both liquid and powder ingredients in the same pod.
"The product that you're using in there really does matter — same with the tier of product," she said. "If you're using a lower-tiered product that doesn't have as much of those cleaning ingredients in there … you're going to be more likely to experience a failure at the end of the cycle — either your dishes are still dirty or still wet — and that reiterates this [sense] that in order to get clean dishes, you have to basically put them into your dishwasher already clean."
"And if you are spending the time and energy and water and energy to wash your dishes at the sink before you're putting them in, you're negating all of the sustainability benefits of using the dishwasher," she noted.
Lightning round: Other tips to start doing today
The dishwasher is one of the most helpful and powerful tools in our homes, but even if we know that abstractly, often we're not taking full advantage of it. So the next time you run a load, consider these other tips:
🍴 While it's a good idea to scrape food off your dishes before you put them in the dishwasher, avoid pre-rinsing your dishes. Beyond the unnecessary water usage, your dishwasher has a sensor to gauge cleaning levels, and if your dishes are already somewhat clean, it may not do the full cleaning cycle that other dishes in there may require.
✋ A dishwasher pod should go in the detergent container, instead of tossing it anywhere. Make sure your hands and the container are dry when you do this.
🫧 Clean your filter regularly (check your manual if you don't know where it is).
And lastly, don't forget to put big pots and pans in the back of the dishwasher. Otherwise, they could block the detergent from getting to all of your dishes.
💰Get TCD's free newsletters for easy tips to save more, waste less, and make smarter choices — and earn up to $5,000 toward clean upgrades in TCD's exclusive Rewards Club.
Cool Picks
