I just dumped last remnants of a large pot of soup down the disposal. So without a disposal, how do you get rid of stuff like that?

I don't use the disposal a lot, but I would not be without it.

I have a Kohler Whitehaven, and I have a garbage disposal. I have never thought about what my drain looks like:)

If you have a garbage disposal, you do not have to use it. If you do not have one, you do not have a choice. I use mine very seldom, but at times I really need it - like when I cook fish, which is at least once a week. If you do not cook, you do not need it, otherwise you do IMO.

I have one and wouldn't be without. I put very little down it, mostly last little bits of oatmeal, stuck on this and that. Before this house I lived without a GD for 6 years and it was a PITA. You have to trap every little random pea.

It's the single most annoying thing to me during our renovation, having no disposal. Never knew how much I loved mine before. :)

I also used a sink during the reno that did not have a GD & found it annoying. So much so, that I also put GD in the prep sink, which I wasn't planning to do. Cleaned my elderly Aunt's sink today - no GD. I find those little bits of food in the strainer disgusting.

We bought a fixer this summer that the disposal was not working. I've lived with it since then. It is GROSS to fish food out before it goes down and clogs the pipes. My kids and husband were terrible about scraping food away before putting their plates in the sink. I would take the dirty plates out and scrape them but some food had always fallen down. We are mid reno now and I have a powerful disposal going in with a single large sink. I say get the disposal.

Definitely put in a disposal.

I live in Germany and garbage disposals are not legal here. It is one of the things I really miss about the US!

What do you do if you have a food like a soup that has gone off and you need to get rid of? In the toilet. I'm serious. That is what everyone does here.

I do have a garbage disposal, but I put things that can't go down it, like fat trimmed off a steak, into a bag in the freezer and throw it in the garbage on garbage pick up day. I do this during hot months especially - do not need to during the winter.

It would be a bit of a pain to freeze bad soup:)

As the man of the house, meaning the guy that has to install, repair, and unclog it, I'm not a fan. We had them for 30 years, but didn't put one in our new house. We compost all of the veggies, meat trimmings go in the freezer until trash day or get used to make stock, and we don't let things go bad. If we're not going to eat something up in a few days, we freeze it. If I had a big pot of soup that had turned, I'd strain the liquid down the drain, and freeze the solids for trash day.

The main reason we didn't put one in, though, is because I was told (apparently incorrectly) that they are bad for septic systems. I've since heard that that is not true, but I'm happy not having one, and my wife has somehow survived.

We have septic, so no disposal. We drain soups and liquid things into the sink, and throw the solids into the trash. We also always have a drain trap thing in the sink.

I've never lived anywhere that had a disposal, so it's not something I miss. But if we ever move somewhere that has city sewer, we're getting a garbage disposal!

I'm with Lars. I have one and seldom use it but it really helps on occassion. If you are on a septic system, you will need to strain out all of the waste anyway.

If you don't have one, you may have guests who assume that you do and throw stuff in the sink. I use mine but only for small bits of things (I know our water plants have to do more work to purify water with lots of stuff in it so I don't use it for big things.) I'm always a bit alarmed when I see people put things like a whole slice of pizza into a drain! I don't say anything but I'll pull it out and throw it in the garbage, just like I pull recyclables out of the trash and put into my recycle bin.

jesslake it's great that you have compost pickup! I suppose I could put vegetable compost items into my yard waste bins - you've given me an idea.

I don't have one of these, but they make disposals for those on septic. https://www.insinkerator.com/us/en/evolution-septic-assist-garbage-disposal

My city encourages residents to put food scraps (and pizza boxes) into the "green" cans for composting. We also have a small compost bin in our yard as well as a worm farm. We also have disposals on both kitchen sinks and we'd be %^$#$ed without them. Some dude has the balls to say he's the man so he fixes it? Well *I* snake the drains around here and I'll take a malfunctioning GD repair over a clogged drain any day. (Also I've never had one go bad in 25 years.)

Our whole neighborhood has septic systems - we all have garbage disposals. Our septic systems are 25 years old. I don't put much down the disposal, only the small bits. Stinky stuff (ie, raw onion, etc) goes right into the garage trash. Non-stinky goes into the kitchen trash can.

We did not put one in when we remodeled and I don't miss it.

I join the ranks of those who don't like to fish out the errant bit of onion and odd grains of rice from the strainer. I also live in a municipality that has a green waste can for weeds, tree trimmings and such, plus food waste, paper towels, paper napkins, and tissue. I keep a stainless steel bowl on the counter

into which all the kitchen waste is scraped and soft paper placed. (Yes, it's a dog food bowl.) It goes to the green waste can as needed, which is fairly often. Actually, I keep two nested, one to use and one to replace the one that will end up being washed as soon as it's empty. What goes down the drain is crumbs and escapees from scraping, IOW, all the little bits that are on the bottom of the sink when I rinse it. I chose a small GD knowing that was going to be its function in life. Much better than clearing yuk from a strainer.

I used to use my GD almost exclusively, but when we were renovating and I saw how much I was actually putting down the drain I decided to go the green bin route. I still have the GD so I don't have to deal with the little bits that get caught in the strainer. Wouldn't be totally without one.

We debated about putting in a GD in the new kitchen or not. We settled on putting one on the clean-up sink and skipping it on the prep sink. We are buying a compost bin that we'll store under the prep sink. This was a compromise between my BF's need to be green and my dislike for touching the gooey stuff that a strainer catches. The prep zone refuse will mostly be vegetation, the clean-up zone will be bits of food off of plates.

I have a friend whose business is Mycrocycle Bokashi Composting Systems. I've intended to buy her kit and get started composting for some time now and I think with the new kitchen that I'll finally do it.

We lived without one for several years and so happy to have one again!!! Yes we compost almost everything but you stilll always end up with little bits that clog the strainer. I'm very happy to not have to clean that out anymore. It's a very tiny proportion of our compost that goes down the drain so I don't feel bad about it.

Sorry if I offended anyone; I know that women can and do repair things around the house- just not around our house. I've never had a clogged drain other than hair in the bathroom lavatory, but I've done plenty of GD repairs. I guess I'm just lucky.

I've lived with septic for about 25 years so very limited disposal use. I had one in my last house but rarely used it. I moved to a different house with city sewer and still rarely use it because I just forget I have it. I had one removed from my lake home that also has a septic system since I wasn't planning to use it and I wanted to free up space under the sink. I put some things like peelings, etc. in a compost bucket that I take to the woods at the lake. I scrape food waste into the garbage can. If it's something really wet like soup I flush it down the toilet as mentioned above. If you have one you think you can't live without it but you quickly adjust. If I wasn't on a septic system I'd have one for the rare occasion I really needed it.

To the direct question, yes, get a disposer, even if you have a septic system. And when you get one, spend a few more $$ and get a quiet one. What a difference. The quiet ones have bigger motors and do a better job...and they are practically silent. My wife is losing some hearing, so every now and then I put some ice in the disposer so she can hear that it's running.

And to the corollary issue, septic tanks, nothing could be better for a septic system than a disposer that grinds up food. Septic systems are basically underground compost piles. They are designed to decompose food and other waste materials into other waste materials which are safe for the soil. It is all biological and self sustaining. Food solids? Well what else would you put into the disposer? Liquids don't need to be ground up, so solids it is. Meats? Nothing decomposes faster than meat. There's a compost professional in San Antonio who composts dead horses, deer, and cattle that have been hit on the road. It takes 4 days in his piles to completely decompose down to nothing. Bones, fats, meat, hooves, everything goes in 4 days. Surely your septic system can handle some ground up salad greens and other left overs.

I grew up in a house with septic and a disposal and I don't remember any special problems.

Before our remodel, I'd never lived without a garbage disposal. We compost and basically never used our old garbage disposal, so I thought it wouldn't change anything if we didn't have one except to save some money.

Biggest regret of the remodel. We still compost the bulk of our food waste, but I didn't realize how much stuff had been going down the garbage disposal. Now all of that is caught in our strainer, which needs to be emptied/cleaned constantly, and it smells weird if you don't keep on it. Some very liquid items (like the dregs of soup) also make a lot more sense to pour down the sink, but then all the solid bits clog up the strainer.

Don't do this to yourself!

If you can have one, have one. I can't stand those damn strainers and having to get my fingers in there to empty and clean them. Then stuff seems to always slip around them into the drain. Ugh.

I'm very careful and don't abuse mine, but I would never choose not to have one if I could.

I'd give up my DW before I would my disposal. I am careful what I put down the disposal but gee, trying to pick out grains of rice and soggy cereal is disgusting when one doesn't have one. A neighbor was determined to compost all her food scrapes. Within weeks, we had a skunk and rat problem in the neighborhood. After 6 months, the city (small 6th class city) asked her to stop doing this.

The house we rent on the Vineyard for a month each summer doesn't have one and with the boys eating cereal multiple times daily, it is the bain of my existence. It smells and is disgusting.

Get a disposal.

Yes, rentals! When I have to deal with them in rentals it's such a PITA.

We decided not to put one in our new kitchen. For several reasons:

• We're on septic and some say you should avoid using them
• One bonus of not having a disposal is that we have more room under the sink.
• In my previous home sometimes the disposal would get stinky, even though I would run it when I knew food was down there
• I wrecked a lot of spoons with my old disposal. Somehow things would fall down there and I didn't know until too late. Pulling the spoons out was always fun. With a single bowl sink I am guessing that would happen even more for me now.
• My old disposal would sometimes get clogged. I dont' have to worry about that happening

I really don't miss having a disposal. I thought I might, but I have never once thought about it.

I'm not sure I understand what gross stuff people are dealing with in the dish drains. I don't find it a big deal to rinse our dishes in the sink, or dump uneaten soup and just pull the drain and dump it in the garbage which is right next to the sink. It never gets that full.

Yes Yes Yes, for all the reasons stated above. Hate all the bits and pieces!!! i compost the big stuff!

we have a large kohler apron sink with garbage disposal in it we are on septic so i try not to put a lot of stuff down example when i clean the frig i double bag the leftovers and put take it to the neighborhood dumpsters or when we have a lot of people over i'll take that to the dumpsters too) when it's just the two of us i usually rinse the dishes in the sink and send the scraps down the drain subdivision doesn't allow compost or we would do that

In some areas, it's against code to have a disposal if you have septic. Are people doing it anyway?

I remember my parent's disposal. Lots of spoons got chewed up, and they didn't run it all that often. (Why was it spoons, and never knives or forks???).

In our very first house we had a garbage disposal. I didn't learn until later one day that the carrots I put down the disposal shot up all over our master bathroom shower.

Needless to say, I never used it again at that house. ;-)

The older disposals did not let you remove and clean the black flange at their opening and they would get disgusting and smelly. Newer one allows you to easily remove and clean them. Since I have a dw I can't imagine a spoon getting down in the disposer but they sure did when we didn't have a dw and had to do all the cutlery in the sink. I don't have septic but if you do I would do further research on this website. Some time ago it came up and was extensively discussed. I agree with the poster above that a well functioning garbage disposal ought to be a boon to your septic system but I also recall that there were many people who did not agree with that point of view.

Definitely put in a GD! And, put it on both sinks if you have both a cleanup and prep sink. We only put one on our cleanup sink b/c my DH was trying to save money, and it's one of my regrets. When we build again, if he wants to do the same, it's the cleanup sink that doesn't get it! (My DH does most of the cleanup - so I'm sure he'll change his mind!)

Nope, no compost pickup or anything remotely like that around here.

We are on septic and have a GD. I use it probably more than most people above and have had absolutely no problems! We have the InSinkerator Evolution Septic Assist and we do use the bio-charge - I don't know if it helps or not, but since it's supposed to help, we do use it. Most municipalities today allow you to have GD if you have one designed for septic systems.

No, the refuse does not end up in the ocean (or even rivers, etc.) It goes into the septic tank and, as Dchall discussed, it breaks down in the tank and actually helps the septic system to work better. See his/her post - it's correct.

If you live somewhere where they dump into the ocean or similar, then you have bigger problems than people using GDs - not to mention untreated public waste. I didn't think that was even legal, at least not in the USA.