If I had a dishwasher, I wouldn't. I prefer to handwash and dry the "good stuff". I can't stand spots and I actually never liked the feeling of things that were washed in the dishwasher, too squeaky for me. *shiver, shudder*

Are you going to post photos of your new kitchen, Monica? I'd love to see it.

I do. I read that the only harm it does, is it can cause it to rust around the rim at the top. I have been doing it for the last 10 years and haven't had a problem or rust.

I follow your routine, Monica, except I leave them soaking until the next morning unless I'm cleaning up after hosting a dinner. (Not sure I can remember when THAT last happened. LOL)

Everything but my cast iron frying pans go in the dishwasher, unless it will swish clean with hot tap water. They're just as shiny and slick as they were when they were brand new 40 years ago.

Flamingo, what do you mean by squeaky?

Sometimes I think I spend more time trying to fit odd shapes into the DW than it would take to actually wash the thing, but I'd rather do that than wash and dry things. Everything comes out shiny and dry, never a spot, yet I never use the "DRY" function on my Maytag.

I'll never understand how one can "enjoy" or "prefer" washing dishes! It's a loud, hot, messy chore! I've read people consider it family time, but it's not for us. Too many other good options for us as a family to spend time at the kitchen sink. Of course, we have six kids (all adults now) and we didn't have a DW for the first 15 years. I've washed several million dishes in my time.

Why DON'T you put your pots and pans in the DW? If it can withstand the heat and abuse of cooking and soaking in the sink, how can the dishwasher hurt it?

Sherry

Yes, everything but the hard anodized aluminum. I have the Fisher & Paykel dishdrawers, so I fill the top one with dishes and the bottom one with pots and pans.

Sometimes, the dishwasher can't get off all the gunk, but I much prefer letting it do the bulk of the work. I just scrape off the worst bits and put the rest in the dishwasher.

I prefer to me good pots and pans by hand.

By hand. I've had mine 23 years and they're still like new. They aren't hard to wash. They're stainless steel and clean up like they're Teflon-coated. I don't even have to soak them. Mine are Belgique. They've really gone down in price, too.

Other than my regular cast iron, everything goes into the dishwasher--and has for over 26 years. That includes the stainless pots and pans, knives, enamelled cast iron, even wooden rolling pins.

The dishwasher does a great job of getting them all spotlessly clean, and hasn't ruined any of them yet.

Sherry, dishwasher cleaned dishes have a funny feel to me- they're SO clean and have that coating or finish to them that you don't get from handwashing. I would cringe when I was stacking plates, they would squeak together and make that horrible eeeeky noise and I just hated unloading the dishwasher. I can't stand the feel of cotton balls either, they're also squeaky, and styrofoam, oh that's the worst!

Since it's just the two of us, not having a dishwasher is no hardship. Woody usually washes and I dry. I have a type of eczema that acts up if I get wet a lot, so drying is my job.

I put everything in the dishwasher except cast iron or aluminum. I would much rather be doing something else besides washing dishes. I think I have washed my share of dishes in my lifetime with four children and not had a dishwasher then. I like the way it makes stainless shine.

Sue

I hand wash quite a bit of stuff. All really big items, my knifes, my old tupperware, from the 70's, wooden spoons, aluminum and cast iron.

Lots just sits in the drainer till the next morning and gets put away dry then. But some things, I like spot free, like my pots and pans, Fissler from Germany, and those get dried.

Moni

I put everything EXCEPT my iron frying pan in the DW. I even put steak knives with wooden hasndles, all my pots. Sometimes if I burn something, I'll put the pot in the DW first and take it out and scrub with a Brillo pad, then rinse and viola! My Mom and 2 sisters insist it's better to hand-wash anything big. Huh?

Just add my name to Sherry's post.

Geez--I forgot those things Moni posted. I never, ever put my good knives (Wustoff) in the dishwasher. Steak knives go in, however. Tupperware doesn't go in either, but I don't use much of that anymore. Gone to glass containers.

Gosh flamingo - I'm exactly the same way! Although I do put most things in the dishwasher (I'm lazy!), sometimes I just can't stand the feeling. And I HATE cotton balls! Cannot stand the squish. I thought I was just weird.

Suzieque

I never put my bone china in the dishwasher.

You ARE weird, Suzieque, I'm just weird with ya! lol

I always hand-washed my good china too, and the silverware, after a big holiday dinner. And THAT was when I really wanted to use a dishwasher, when I'd had a lot of people over for dinner!

Oh, all right....I hand wash my china, crystal and silver, too. But it kills me! Everybody always helps with that chore and I worry about chips, etc. because it was my grandmother's from the 1920s. We don't use it more than once or twice a year, so I live through it. The paint would probably melt off the china, the crystal might etch, etc.

But the pots and pans - into the dishwasher.

I have no bone china or real "silverware" here so if it fits in the dishwasher it will probably get put in there. Now if I had some glass ware that would etch or wear off the design painted on, it would not go into the dishwasher.

Sue

I don't put my good knives in the dishwasher nor my non stick or pampered chef bakeware.

I still do alot of hand washing.

One of the reasons I don't entertain or use any of the good china is *because* it all has to be washed by hand. The gold comes off the china. The crystal etches. The silverware...oh, I don't know, it just doesn't seem smart.

I very clearly remember being physcally sick for two days after one big Thanksgiving dinner. I'd been up until three a.m. cleaning up after everyone *finally* left.

I have a set of Saladmaster Stainless Steel that is 35 years old. It gets washed in the dishwasher everyday and still looks like it did the day I got it.

Even though I have a Pots & Pans cycle, I do them by hand. I never found them to get as clean in the dishwasher. Usually there is some food stuck on them and I have to wash them by hand afterwards. I have tried it on and off over the years and have pretty much given up on the dishwasher. Even Corningware and Pyrex don't get clean. Maybe it is my dishwasher or soap or water or the way I load them in it. Who knows?!
Clare

I've never had a DW and I have had several...that got a pan clean that I boiled potatoes in and I have to rinse milk glasses. They look clean until you hold them up to the light. I keep a long handled scrubbing brush in my DW for cleaning pans like the potato pans and spatulas.

Since I don't own anything "good" it doesn't matter. I scrub the pans because the stuff doesn't come off in the dishwasher but I prefer to have them run through anyway, makes me think they are cleaner that way.

If your pots and pans aren't cleaned by your dishwasher, neither is anything else! You need new (or better) dishwashers. Or try a different detergent. Or, like Clare, load it correctly.

And furthermore, since I'm on my high horse, I never even rinse them! I just scrape off the solids and in they go! My pots and pans are 40 years old and shiny, my dw is an 8yo Maytag. My detergent is the powdered famous stuff - gosh, I can't remember the name of it! How embarrassing!

My dishwasher has a pot scrubber cycle, but I have never used it. I use the heavy cycle when I have stuck on food, such as the insert to the crockpot and it really cleans it well. I very seldom rinse my dishes either. I kept telling Amber how well my dishwasher worked as she always had to rinse hers and it was only about 5 years old, that they bought a new dishwasher and put it in, now she is really pleased with it. We don't have the same brands either.

Sue

Yes. My good stainless steel cookware is a set of the "modern" looking Revereware stainless steel pans I bought with the last of my parents' S&H trading stamps in 1964-5. The handles are black bakelite or something like that, and they have discolored from the dishwasher. I scrub all the cooked on stuff out of them before I put the pans in the diswasher or they won't come out clean.

I recently bought a Cuisinart huge soup pot (12 quart? larger?), and I don't put that in the dishwasher as it is so big. Moreover, it water spots easily, so I always buff it dry to restore and preserve the shine.

I don't simply because they take up too much room and are hard to fit in there. A few large pans can easily take up most of the top or bottom rack and it seems more efficient to just wash by hand than run the DW. But if it's close enough to a full load and I will be running it anyway, I do fit them in where I can.

Ha! I can't stand cotton balls either. And cardboard makes me feel queezy. As for dish washing...everything I have, I wash by hand.

*wraps arms around Suzieque and Marilyn, glad to have found her long-lost sisters of weird*

If I HAVE to touch a cotton ball, I have to wet it with something as fast as I can. Alcohol, water, something. That takes out the squeak. :) Even popcorn can weird me out if it's too squeaky.

Does anyone have an aversion to wooden spoons and popsicle sticks? I'm ok with cotton balls but wooden utensils and even those cardboardy "chinet" paper plates weird me out.

My stainless steel cookware is about 42 years old and still looks good. If I have room in the dishwasher, I use the pots and pans cycle and the cookware goes in.

Wooden spoons and popsicle stick aversion here! Also the little wooden paddles that come with those tiny individual tubs of ice cream, as well as cardboard and newspaper. Oh, and pencils! I can't stand to use pencils. Drove my grade school math teachers nuts, but I've always used pens.