Question for the Pocket Protector Crowd to Ponder

[mixfinder]

I had dinner at my partner parents home. I was agog at the amount of water used to wash and rinse the dishes and then set them in the dishwasher racks to drain dry. The water was running with the stopper open and three times as much water went into rinsing, with lots of rubbing.
I shared my opinion that most modern dishwashers use less energy than hand washing. His answer was!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
If you have a full load and put all the dishes in at once you may run the dishwasher. However, in loading partial loads his belief is the bacteria on the dirty dishes is multiplying exponentially and every time the door is opened or you place your hand in the dishwasher, you are receiving a bacteria shower.
Any studies, truths or surefire, prove him wrong, articles or atudies lying around?

Kelly

 

[sudsmaster]

I suppose there is a tradeoff of sorts.

Unless you wear thick rubber gloves, you'll never get handwash water as hot as a good dishwasher (150F+) will get. So the end product of the dishwashing will be relatively more bacteria free than the end product of handwashing. Even if the dishes have set in the dishwasher for a day or two.

As for a bacteria "shower", bacteria just don't leap off dirty surfaces. They're not like fleas. However they can release airborne spores, as do molds. But I still don't think there's any more danger from a bacteria shower from opening a dishwasher than, say, opening the lid on a trash can.

If you're really concerned, get a couple of F&P dish drawers. You can run partial loads without feeing guilty .

 

[DADoES]

>>>points to self<<<

Not uncommon that a partial load will hang in my dishwasher for a week until it's run. I don't recall any incident of feeling creepy-crawlies crawling over myself during the time I've had a dishwasher in-my-own-house .... which target date is 9/29/1991.

This has been the practice ever since my parents got the KDI-17a (although, of course, a week wait wasn't the time-frame involved for a family of five).

 

[mixfinder]

Drawers

The concern is not mine, as stated. My partner's father is Asian and retired from a life long of working for the Cargill company and many chemicals and experiments. He is convinced the bacteria does release contaminants anytime the door is open. He is also sure that 1/4 inch lip around the door meeting the frame is never properly sanitized, he says. I have been going to their house for 2 years and have seen the dishwasher turned on once. Their son likes to bring such topics up when I am there to play Devil's advocate. I can certainly attest than I and many other US citizens are not dead or sickened as a result of not running the dishwasher everytime a dish is added.
Rather than conjecture and admonition I was wondering if any studies exist in the Chemist's world of those working with soap and dishwashers.
Kelly

 

[hoover1060]

I'm with Glenn

I don't pre-rinse all that much, and its not unusual for dishes to gather in my DW for 3-4 day before its run. There is however a MAHVELOUS little button on my DW(as well as on many others today) that will solve the fungus amongus problem until the DW is full.
That button is "Rinse and Hold" Even my thirsty KDS17A only uses about 2 gallons of water for that cycle.

 

[toggleswitch]

Yes, but a dishwaher kills LITERALLY 100 times more microbes than hand-washing. It degreases better than hand-washing, and gets into nooks and crannies that a sponge may not be able to reach. It also uses less water.

Speaking of (kitchen) sponges now THAT is bacteria-laden and gross!

Bottom line is people LOVE to play with water and waste it galore. We are gestated in it; it is innate and part of us. IIRC most of the earth's human population lives within 100 miles of a (large) body of water.

Pehaps this explains our love/admiration of clothes washers, especially ones that actually use water. It is, in my opinion, a primal instinct.

http://www.uagrad.org/Alumnus/w05/germ.html

 

[toggleswitch]

~That button is "Rinse and Hold" Even my thirsty KDS17A only uses about 2 gallons of water for that cycle.

This, in conjunction with a few tablespoons of household bleach should hush-up the nasty voices in the heads of even the most germ-phobic amoung us.

 

[panthera]

A complex question

Personally, growing up with and living with dogs, wolves, snakes, cats, frogs, mice, hamsters, rabbits...all uncaged and free, I don't get all that het up about the dirty dishes waiting in my dishwasher to be washed.
Kelly, I suggest that the question has several aspects more than the simple 'bacterial shower' point.
If the dishes held food which was contaminated with salmonella or had been eaten from by someone with a contagious disease such as the common cold, then, yup...I surely would not care to handle them or leave them. But that is gut feeling not science.
Since the food left on the dishes is prima facie free of dangerous pathogens when put into the machine, I just have trouble imagining any tremendous amount of them spontaneously generating within the machine.
But who knows? Legionnaire's disease grows in warm water systems...
I haven't found any data on this on the internet, but how do labs and hospitals which work with reusable utensils deal with this?
Somehow, I suspect the answer is less than an autoclave...

 

[mixfinder]

Panthera you're a marvel

In reading Toggles link I understand fecal contaminants enter the the sponge and sink area from raw foods. Typically, the dishwasher is accepting pieces soiled with cooked foods and so the likely hood of active contaminants is somewhat lowered. Especially in an Asian household where the cooking equipment, cleaver, cutting board and wok would not likely go inside a dishwasher.
The problem was never selling me on the idea of using a dishwasher, it is that of a 76 year old Asian gentlemen who is Lord and Master of his castle.
Thanks for understanding the question guys.
Kelly

 

[joeekaitis]

I like how a microbiologist speaking on the radio put it:

"The moment you step from the shower, your body begins to renew the fecal shroud we all walk around in."

Handshake, anyone?

 

[peterh770]

The purpose of my dishwasher is to store dirty dishes until full, then run. Maybe once a week. No prerinsing before loading, just a light scrape and in they all go.

 

[toggleswitch]

I agree. Don't want to see piles of dishes and kitchen utensils in the sink or out of it. I don't even have a dish-drainer (in the main kitchen.)

I'm with you Peter; any moron can wash a dish. The machine does it better (well the ones that use a respectable quantity of water not 5 eye-droppers full) and more efficiently but primarily it keeps the kitchen looking tidy.

 

[MrX]

Our dishwasher runs every day. There's no question of leaving it to fill for a week. We'd never be able to fit a weeks dishes, even for 2 people into one dishwasher

 

[rp2813]

Kelly, your partner's dad sounds like he's got a touch of Howard Huges syndrome. At 76, you're not likely to change him so I guess you should just chalk it up to lively discussion and nothing more.

Like with others here, dishes can sit in my KA for nearly a week and nobody in my household has ever gotten sick from adding more until a full load was ready for washing. I don't even use the rinse & hold cycle much unless it's really crusty early arrivals that need caked-on stuff coaxed off prior to waiting about a week for a full load to accumulate. More often than not the dishes appear to be clean after just the rinse & hold cycle with no detergent. That should speak volumes about a full-on wash cycle with both cups filled.

Ralph

 

[whirlcool]

For those concerned about their sponges here is a trick that will clean them.
Dip them in a water/bleach solution. Put in microwave on high for 20 seconds. the bleach and the heat will kill anything that may be living in your sponge.

 

[volvoguy87]

Sponges.

I always rinse all the soap out of my sponge when I am finished using it. Also, every once in a while I put the sponge in the dishwasher with a load of dishes and run the sanitizing cycle. The sponge comes out dry, but still plyable, just like when new. It won't fix a stained, tattered, worn out sponge, but my sponge never smells bad!

If only I could clean my housemates as easily,
Dave

 

[danemodsandy]

Running the DW Every Night...

...Has its advantages, if you can come up with a full load. The main one is that the dirty dishes don't sit around and smell. Even "clean dirty" dishes have an odour, and here in Georgia's heat and humidity, really dirty dishes can get pretty feisty-smelling after a day or two, particularly if you're economical with the air-conditioning, as we are. Yeah, you can keep the door latched, but every time you open it, PHEW!

I like that nice old-time smell of Pine-Sol and Jubilee kitchen wax in my kitchen, not Sunday's chicken wafting from the dishwasher.

 

[neptunebob]

Not only the odor but if you leave dirty dishes in the dishwasher too long it attracts ants! Fortunately for me, not the ants, I can usually find enough dishes to wash every day.