Funny, I always think of washing things without a sinkful of water as the less thorough way. That is what I usually do, with a few teacups, and maybe wine glasses and a pan or two, every day. A few drops of detergent on a dishcloth; steel wool if needed for a pot. I have a double sink, and a dish drainer that takes up a frustrating amount of space on the counter. I keep trying to banish it but it comes back.

I wash up as I go, so that by the end of the meal there is very little to clean up. I keep looking for the waitress but she is no where to be found! I just cannot abide dirty dishes in the sink.

My knives, pans/pots are all hand washed but glassware, plates, bowls, etc. all go in the dishwasher. Most items don't need a rinse as I have a "pre-rinser" that enjoys his job.

I solved the stemmed wine glass problem by using stemless that fit in the top rack.

But the best part is the deal I have with Dad. I cook, he cleans up. Not a bad set up.

I wash up as I go, so that by the end of the meal there is very little to clean up. I keep looking for the waitress but she is no where to be found! I just cannot abide dirty dishes in the sink.

My knives, pans/pots are all hand washed but glassware, plates, bowls, etc. all go in the dishwasher. Most items don't need a rinse as I have a "pre-rinser" that enjoys his job.

I solved the stemmed wine glass problem by using stemless that fit in the top rack.

But the best part is the deal I have with Dad. I cook, he cleans up. Not a bad set up.

Left to right all the way... It is the right way! ;)

Everything goes into the dishwasher. We just don't use things that can't go in the dishwasher.

Double sink, dish rack in left sink, wash dishes under running water on right side, stack soapy dishes on left, hose down with spray head. Or, dishwasher.

I am fanatical about washing as I go. When I finish cooking a pretty involved dinner, every utensil, pot, or dish is either actually in use holding food, or is clean and either put away or drying. Well, usually and almost . . .

I do like you do, dedtired. However, I don't run the water and waste it. I run it long enough to get the pot wet, then turn it off and was with a dobie-type pad with dishsoap. then I rinse and lay on a pad to air dry. Hubby finishes drying and puts them away. This is just for things that dont fit in the dishwasher and pots and pans which I don't put in the dishwasher,

Sherry

I wash as I go, so usually very little left when meal is ready. I wash my pots & pans, knives and any special dishes by hand; the rest go in DW. I do the stacked dishes to the far right, sink full of soapy water on the right and rinse over left sink and place on my drain pad.

I only do right to left because the configuration of my kitchen countertops wouldn't allow the other way.

I put just about everything except pots and pans in the dishwasher and some of those go in there too.

I have a single sink set into an island. To the left is about 18 inches of counter space with the dishwasher below that. Under the sink itself is a cabinet to keep soap, etc. There is no counter space to the right.

So, it's wash and rinse in one sink, and set the clean dishes to my left, because there is no counter on the right, LOL. Elery and I both like to cook and so we both do the dishes when necessary.

Hi, Peppi, I miss you!

Annie

98% of everything goes in the dishwasher. If I've fried an egg or something in the morning then I'll just give it a quick rinse with a drop of detergent and wipe it dry. It's the dishwashers job to do dishes, that's why we paid all that money for it.
Oh and my water/milk drinking glass, I'll re-use it all day and leave it by the sink

Everything starts to the left except "contaminated" stuff like chickeny knives which start in the sink. These get washed first then go to the left with he dirty stuff. Sink gets cleaned with antibacterial, sponge goes in the microwave. Everything visibly dirty gets a quick wash - usually with a brush- and returned back to the left. Now everything gets its final wash and makes it to the right of the sink on a drying pad. And the sink gets a thorough cleaning.

Might sound like a bit of a process but it's really not bad. I used to be more fanatical about cleaning as I go, but somehow my kitchen doesn't lend itself to doing anything efficiently. A couple weeks ago I decided I finally need a new kitchen, so I laid it out just slightly differently to where I think it should help. Cabinets should be delivered in a month and hopefully installed within a few weeks after that - can't wait.

Wow, FOAS, a kitchen reno. Hope we don't lose you to the Kitchens forum. My advice is to stay away. You get ten different ideas for every decision and end up more confused than when you started.

I've never been too good about the "wash as you cook" method. I mean, how can you be washing if you are cooking? Okay, if I put the meat loaf in the oven, I clean up, but if it's something that requires pretty much constant attention, I don't.

I do agree with the "let the DW ( and I don't mean Dear Wife) do the work" method. I put everything in there that will go, which is pretty everything but the Wusthof knives.

LOL Pam, no, I'm staying away from Kitchens. Don't want to become TKO for a house I don't plan on staying in much longer. Years ago I spent countless hours trying to come up with a design I liked and couldn't, hired a KD for ideas and didn't like anything she came up with either, and finally gave up. So this time around I did it with no love or thought. Went to a cabinet store two weeks ago Wednesday and drafted up a plan, took my wife that night to approve the plan, chose a style and placed the order. About the same amount of thought has gone into two bathroom remodels. The day after I placed the kitchen order the contractor came in and now the first bathroom is just shy of done. Electric service was replaced/upgraded Thursday, ducting for the range hood is through the roof, and he's gutting the second bathroom on Monday. Shopping and decisions for that one will commence in a couple hours. Once that's done he'll move right on to the kitchen if the cabinet order is close to arriving. How's that for planning and scheduling? Bang bang bang!

A lot better than me. As in most things, I obsessed beyond all reason. One full bath and the kitchen. Honestly, I think the things I obsessed over the most ended up being the biggest mistakes. Can't tell you how long I looked at fridges. I ended up with a side by side, which I can't stand. To give it credit, it has held up very well.

I think the bang bang bang method works as well as the obsessing method -- at least when it comes to home repairs. And dish wishing.

I try to wash as I cook, which I find minimises after-meal cleanup. To answer your question as to how, Dedtired, I have the sink full of hot soapy water and drop the dirty dishes/utensils in as I finish with them. Then while I'm standing waiting for some process to occur- meat to brown, water to boil etc, instead of standing there like a pudding watching it, I wash a few dishes. Usually by the time the meal is ready everything's pretty well washed up.
Drain and refill the sink, leave anything to soak that needs it, eat, finish the dishes.
I always do glasses and cups first as the water is running into the sink, so I can rinse them as the sink fills. Everything stays in the drainer rack until I put it away, dried by my good friend Mother Nature, (actually more hygenic to air dry than towel dry), usually the next morning.
Dishwashers are not very common here and I really dislike them anyway so I wouldn't have one if you gave it to me.

Standing there like a pudding -- what a great expression and good description of me. I'm feeling rather pudding-like lately.

Why do you not like dishwashers? I always thought Oz would be an amazing place to live but I may have to rethink that if DWs are not common. I will have to watch more carefully on House Hunters International for Aussie houses to see if they include DWs. I do love the accent.

Pam and I are both obsessive when it comes to remodels, I worry over every detail, and many times after it's installed or delivered, it still takes awhile to "like" it. I also dislike my side by side fridge, but they didn't make a 42" french door model back in '02. Ironically I was looking at my kitchen last night and thinking it was 11 yrs old, I am still very happy with all but an appliance and my sink. I have a very workable design, we had 3 designers attempt to change it , but with the exception of changing the peninsula for an island (love that), no one could come up with a better design.

To keep this on topic, dirty dishes are stacked to the left, above the diswasher. They are rinsed with a brush or nylon scrubby (except when DH does the dishes and he soaps up the sponge and then leaves it sodden and soapy in the bottom of the sink). My scraping sink is on the right and items for the dishwasher are placed inside. Drip dry or dryables like pots & knives are placed on the right to be dried.
I'm a really messy cook and love to have DH here to help me clean as I go!

Wish I could smugly say that "I wash as I go" - but that would not be truthful. I'm guilty of sometimes letting the dishes back up on the counter to the left of the sink. Then I usually grab the largest bowl or pot, scrub it a bit if it needs it, fill it with hot water and Dawn liquid and wash glasses first, then silverware/utensils, then plates/mugs/bowls, and lastly pots and pans. I don't run the rinse water the whole time but part of the time.

Often I will tackle the pile beside the sink and put items that can go in the dishwasher in there, then hand wash the items that I don't put in the DW: good knives, wine glasses, pots and pans. I take particular care with the knives and my cast iron pots and pans: wash them, dry them, put them away and the cast iron I heat on the stove a couple of minutes to be sure they are really dry.

All to frequently, the DW is full of clean dishes and needs to be emptied. With my work schedule and being tired from work at night, I don't cook or clean as much as I used to/ought to.

Teresa

Hmm, no formulated process but if studied, I'm sure I have one.
Most stuff goes in the dishwasher, that which doesn't gets stacked next to or in the sink and eventually washed under running water. I never fill the sink, hate washing that way and won't. I clean up when I feel like it (I might have other things to do during daylight hours) maybe several times a day, maybe before bed. The kitchen is always clean at the end of the night unless I'm wildly exhausted.

Thank you Teresa and Bumble for admitting that you let the dishes pile up a bit. I do, too. Sometimes (often) a days worth of dishes pile up on the counter and in the sink until the evening when I do the whole shebang. Since it is only me, it's never a whole lot, unless I've gotten creative.

I just hate coming downstairs in the morning and finding dishes in the sink.

Pam, like you, I have a single basin sink and I don't like it. i don't have a sprayer either... I try to put most things in the dishwasher... non-stick cookware and straight edge knives usually don't go in the dishwasher, but sometimes they do. Sometimes I'll "soak" a pot for a week just to put off washing it as long as possible :O) Some things like the juicer or halogen oven can't go in the dishwasher and I dread washing them. I will hand wash if I'm in a hurry and don't want to wait, but by the time I'm done, the floor is soaked, I'm soaked, and the lamp and candles on the counter behind the sink are floating off the counter in a cascade of water... I'm even messy when I clean :o)

I used to fill the sink with soapy water and rinse in a dish pan of vinegar water and then let things air dry in the drainer (I think dish towels can hold bacteria, so I don't want to wipe dishes that I've just washed with a dish towel that may or may not have bacteria all over it). Now, I wash one dish at a time under running water and just rinse it and put it in the drainer... I just stopped filling the sink and using the dish pan to rinse.

I never clean as I go and I have a friend who chastises me for it constantly, but I'm not likely to change... when I'm cooking, that's what I'm doing... after I'm done and when I feel like it, I'll clean everything in one fell swoop.

Pam, it's not that dishwashers are unknown here (a couple of family members have them) but they tend to be in homes which have been built/remodeled in the last, oh, ten-fifteen years or so. So if you moved here you would have no trouble finding one if the home you moved into didn't have one, and the latest Choice consumer magazine has just published their latest review of the best models.
I don't like them because
a) they take up a hideous amount of space IMO, which I would rather use for storage
b) I really dislike packing and unpacking them
c) I hate waiting around for either the load to be full or the load to actually finish washing when I want a particular item, and for me if I hand wash one or two things it's just as easy to hand wash the lot and be done with it. It rarely takes more than 10-15 minutes, even after a big dinner party. Christmas dinner for 12, with nibbles, turkey, ham and several sides, plus three desserts, all the wine glasses and the good silver, takes about half an hour, and if my SILs help it's a social thing too.
So, no dishwasher for me :-)
"Standing around like a pudding" is a kind of British saying, where a pudding is one of those steamed dough type puddings that are like a stodgy lump ;-)

Well, today I feel like a pudding = a stodgy lump! It's drizzly, chilly, dark, damp, I've been awake since 4 AM and it's Monday too. I think we should declare Monday as National Feel-Like-a-Pudding Day.

Teresa

Whimsical dishwasher here most things go in the dishwasher most days. But then it changes and no pots for a while. Then there are the days I like to do dishes and everything gets hand washed. I now have a dish pad and it gets used sometimes but others the dishes dry in the second sink. Sometimes I even buy foil pans and paper plates so there are no dishes just cutlery. I think I have only hidden dishes in the oven once but it may have been more. Creative dish piles are also an option it is amazing how high you can build. My dishwasher is starting to leave things on the glasses (yes we have taken it apart and cleaned it) I think we have calcium build up in the hot water tank so I do more hand washing now. Many days I have a large bowl in the sink to do small batches. Hubby even has another way to do dishes he fills the sink with wonderful hot water and soap then goes to the computer and waits for the water to cool down (get cold) then he comes back up stairs drains the sink and starts over. Who knew dishes could be so fun.

If you have ever lived in a place where there are water restrictions because of drought, you learn very quickly to not leave the water running while washing dishes. I usually only handwash pots and pans and knives, and the routine is to put hot water and soap in the largest pot, get a very wet soapy sponge or gold-colored scrub cloth, soap up everything, and then turn on water and rinse each piece. You learn very quickly to not leave water running while doing dishes or brushing you teeth, etc.

And I learned in chemistry lab how to wash glassware without using a lot of water. The only way to go, and the method was handy when we were making wine and recycling bottles.