Dishwashing Doctrine

My housemate Sarah preparing to wash the dishes.

One of the endless chores in any sharehouse is of course washing dishes. Sometimes it's even the cause of conflict depending on the uniformity of dishwashing styles within your sharehouse. I think these styles can be placed into two broad categories:

1. The Frequent DishwasherThis person likes to keep on top of the dishes and generally maintain a state of having all the dishes cleaned, generally daily.
   
2. The Accumulate and Wait Dishwasher
   This person lets all the dishes to bank up over a period of days or even weeks, and then washes them all in one massive load.

I can remember during an economics lecture back at Uni when the lecturer asked the class how they manage dishes in their house (this was related to the economic principle we were exploring at the time, which I've forgotten). One of the blokes in the class spoke up and explained that in his sharehouse, the default state was that all the dishes in the house were dirty, and if anyone needed to use one, they would simply wash the dish they needed! Evidently this was a house full of extreme "accumulate and wait" dishwashers!

My preference is the "frequent dishwasher" strategy of washing regularly, washing up as dishes are created and keeping on top of it. This has the following obvious advantages:

• More kitchen bench space will be available for cooking or any other purpose if the benches are not covered in dirty dishes
• Growing mould and the emanation of funky smells is avoided
• Guests are not disgusted by the messiness and untidiness
• Dishes are easier to clean immediately after they've been used than if they've been lift sitting around for a week (e.g. crusty Weet-Bix or porridge or dried pasta sauce is difficult to clean!)
• The dishes/knives/boards/pots/pans/etc are clean and available to use when you next cook, rather than you having to sift through a stack of dishes to find what you need and then having to wash it - this is obviously quite inefficient!
• There is sufficient space in the dish rack to place the washed dishes and allow them to dry.
• The task doesn't build up into a scary monstrosity of a prospect in which no housemate has the courage and will to face up to the challenge of washing a week or two weeks worth of dishes.

For theses reasons, I consider the "frequent dishwasher" school of thought to be far superior. Note that I'm excluding the situation where each housemate wash their own dishes only, while leaving all other dirty dishes unwashed. I guess this is not uncommon but to me that's not really a sharehouse but a house of individuals living separately in the same house, and I feel is quite inefficient, bizarre and not satisfying the principles of a sharehouse.

I find that when housemates have varying preferences for time-frames of washing dishes - that is, when they don't all fall into the same category listed above, then conflict arises. It turns into a game of chicken as to who can hold out for the longest before giving in and washing them all. The housemate who values cleanliness the most inevitably ends up being frustrated with the situation as they have the choice of either putting up with the state of uncleanliness to the detriment of their own comfort, or washing more than their fair share of dishes, and both likely result in feelings of frustration and animosity towards their housemates.

I can think of a few approaches to resolve this issue:
1. Elimination
Apply the principle of prevention being better than cure, or as we say at work, employ the "hierarchy of controls" and choose housemates with whom you share the same dishwashing preferences - thus eliminating the potential for conflict (of course the other elimination strategy is to not live in a sharehouse but I'm assuming here one's circumstances mean a sharehouse is the preferred option). If you already live with housemates who have different dishwashing druthers to your own, consider kindly posing an ultimatum to your housemates to conform or withdraw; assimilate or fuck off; shape up or ship out, or, more politely, please improve your performance or kindly depart the premises.

2. The Loving Sharehouse
Foster a sharehouse where open discussion and communication is encouraged and where housemates feel comfortable raising any issues or irritations with other housemates. In such an environment, raise the issue of washing dishes so that it can be discussed and resolved, with compromises being made where necessary such that differences are reconciled and sharehouse harmony is achieved! In this environment, everyone should naturally be willing to contribute and help each other out.

3. Dishes Roster
Develop the dreaded dishes roster, a structured and strict roster where housemates are required to take turns washing dishes according to the roster.

4. Dishes Guilt
If you're like me and prefer to avoid confrontation and like a state of cleanliness re dishes, consider the useful phenomenon of what I call "dishes guilt". This is where the person who values cleanliness most highly will wash the dishes regularly, even if it's not their turn and even if it means washing them several times in a row. This tends to induce "dishes guilt" in the other housemates, where they will experience sometimes intense feelings of guilt, often accompanied by thoughts such as "I feel like I'm not pulling my weight...I'm a bad person...I really should wash the dishes since it's my turn...my housemate will dislike me and feel contempt towards me...I don't want to be that lazy housemate that everyone hates..." etc. This strategy relies on your housemates being reasonable and considerate people - it won't work with sociopaths or manipulative users and abusers, but hopefully you're not living with these kinds of people, and if you are you've probably got bigger issues to worry about!

When I moved into my current sharehouse a few years ago, the custom was to leave dishes sitting and gathering for about a week, and then do a huge load. I've mentioned, for the reasons outlined above, that I dislike this approach! So I successfully employed strategy 4 - Dishes Guilt which resulted in me and my former housemates Rosie and Prawno fairly sharing the dishwashing according to the volume of dishes we contributed, and dishes generally getting washed daily. This strategy also lends itself to the loving sharehouse which I think is the ideal, and my current sharehouse generally fits into this category.

My sharehouse is one where everyone is fairly relaxed and most things are shared, housemates use other housemates food willy-nilly but generally buy an equal amount of food so that it works out fairly evenly; housemates cook together, take it in turns being head chef, eat together and take turns washing up, and if one person cooks, the other person will generally wash up, so it all works out fairly evenly, everyone's happy and no structured roster is required.

My housemate Sarah was recently away in Canada for three weeks at a jazz drumming workshop, and her friend Marcos was her replacement staying with us at Christmas St during that time. Marcos has lived with his parents in Narre Warren all his life and we thought it would be a good experience for him to live in a sharehouse in an inner-city suburb (Northcote). He turned out to be a wonderful considerate and interesting housemate who brought a relaxed vibe to the sharehouse.

Marcos, the temporary addition to our sharehouse, looking cool.

It was quite intriguing to discover that Marcos had never really learnt to wash dishes before, and this got me thinking about different techniques and styles of the actual process of washing dishes. His rather inefficient technique was to put some detergent on the cloth, run the tap and wash each item under the running water (without filling up the sink). Each item would then be rinsed to remove the suds. Detergent didn't need to be applied to the cloth for each dish because some still remained from the previous application, but the detergent would need to be applied every several dishes.

Now I'm no expert on dishwashing, I've never worked as a dish-pig in a restaurant or anything, but I do consider my own technique to be better than this, and to be quite well thought-out, sensible and efficient. Marcos was keen to learn a better technique so although I felt condescending doing so, I gave him a lesson in washing dishes, and I'll describe my approach below.

Step 1

Empty the left-hand sink except for cutlery, then add all the other cutlery, place the plug in and start filling with water with a squirt of detergent. This step is easier if all the housemates avoid placing dishes in this sink, something I've suggested a number of times but always seems to be ignored - as shown in the photo below:

This is a no-no - the left-hand sink (or the washing sink) should be kept empty.

Step 2
While the sink is filling, put away all of the other dishes presently sitting in the rack/drying area, except for the cutlery.

Dry dishes to be put away.

Step 3
In general, start washing the cleanest dishes first and finish with the dirtiest grimiest ones. I recommend starting with the cups/mugs/glasses/goblets/chalices. Fill the washing sink up with these and wash each one while the others soak, placing the washed cups in the rack to dry. Note that the cutlery should be sitting at the bottom of the sink soaking.

Step 4
While the cups/mugs/glasses/goblets/chalices are drying, put away the dry cutlery which is still there from yesterdays load of dishes.

Step 5
Place some of the plates/bowls into the washing water, rinsing beforehand as necessary, and allow to soak momentarily.

Step 6
As a few of the plate/bowls soak, transfer the cups/mugs/glasses/goblets/chalices, which should now be partly dry, to the alternative/secondary drying area, such as a tea-towel on top of the bench.

The secondary drying area.

Avoid the pitfall of placing washed dishes directly onto the secondary drying area, as this will result in the tea-towel becoming soaked (as with the photo below), which will delay the drying of the dishes and cause higher humidity/dampness in the room.

Another no-no - this is what happens when washed dishes are placed directly onto the secondary drying area.

Step 7
Wash the plates/bowls and place them on the drying rack to dry. Then wash the other relatively clean items such as bread boards and graters, and place them in the drying rack also.

Step 8
Wash the cutlery which has been soaking until now. If you have two separate cutlery-drying receptacles, separate the general cutlery (dinner knives, forks and spoons) from the specialised cutlery (kitchen knives, wooden spoons, peelers, serving spoons, ladles, etc) for ease of putting away after they've dried.

General cutlery and specialised cutlery separated into two drying receptacles.

Step 9
Wash the remaining dirtier items, such as pots, pans, dishes, containers and miscellaneous items, and place them on the drying rack. Transfer partly dried items across to the secondary drying area as necessary if more space is required in the drying rack.

Step 10
Sit back and relax with all the time you've saved  using this efficient dishwashing method and admire your work, and revel in the reverence of your housemates.

Marcos admiring one of my loads of dishes.

You may think this is all a bit rigid, structured and pedantic? Maybe it's not your style but I value efficiency and the time I save allows me to do other things such as writing important blog posts like this one!

One matter of contention is whether or not dishes should be rinsed of suds after they're washed. As may be apparent, I don't bother rinsing washed dishes. I don't suppose suds are healthy, but they can't be too harmful or we wouldn't wash dishes with the detergent, right? Also I only use a small amount of detergent, which reduces the need to rinse.
I'm sometimes accused by my housemates of not washing dishes properly, of leaving remnants of caked-on food on the dishes. I think you could spend hours washing dishes to get them perfectly clean if you wanted to, but I think this is a waste of time, and unnecessary. A few remnants of food aren't going to hurt anyone, and they'll be there to contribute to the next meal you use the dish for.
Once an American guy staying with us for a few months, Charles, came down with a bout of diarrhea, and he blamed me for it, for not washing the dishes properly! The nerve! I highly doubt it was my fault - I'd say it was more likely something to do with his very high-protein body-building diet consisting predominantly of canned tuna and canned chicken that he was eating at the time.
I've only had food-poisoning twice in my life. Once was from some dodgy ham from Bi-Lo that Mum and I used on our home-made pizza's, and the other time was from Lentil As Anything. This demonstrates that my dishwashing technique poses no threat to ones health.
Another matter of personal preference is whether or not to use rubber gloves. My housemate Arthur, Cattie and Sarah all seem to wear gloves; Arthur claims his hands dry out otherwise. Personally I've never used them and I've never had any issues. Also I think washing dishes with no gloves gives you a better connection and better feel and really immerses you in the activity, rather than shielding and removing you from it as gloves do, much like how fixed-gear bikes provide you with a better feel and connection with the road.

I'll finish with a handy tip for you keen young dishwashers out there: add your left-over cut lemons to your dishwashing water - lemon juice is a natural cleaner which will help clean and remove grease from the dishes.

Handy tip - add lemons to your dishwashing water.