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Is Dishwasher Really Useful in Indian Kitchen?

As hard-core foodies, we Indians take great pride in cooking and eating lip-smacking dishes. But, while feasting on mouth-watering and sumptuous meals filled with spices, we don’t realize the hard work that goes into cleaning the dirty vessels in the sink by hand.

We all have grown up watching our parents or house help cleaning the utensils by hand. But, unfortunately, it causes wastage of a lot of time and effort.

Thanks to the advent of a dishwasher, modern Indian households are increasingly adopting the dishwasher as an ideal kitchen appliance for cleaning utensils.

Keep reading this article as we explore how the dishwasher is revolutionizing the way utensils are washed in Indian kitchens nowadays.

Yes, the dishwasher works great for Indian kitchens. It serves as an ideal cleaning appliance that saves you from the stress of washing dishes and avoids pruning your fingers. It requires a one-time investment and allows you to recover the costs many times over.

It takes care of the environment as it consumes less water than manual washing. It also scores higher in terms of cleaning efficiency and maintaining hygiene.

After eating delicious meals, don’t you love to relax rather than standing at the kitchen sink for a long while washing the greasy and stained utensils with your hands?

This article discusses the benefits of a dishwasher, what you can and can’t load in your dishwasher, electricity consumption of dishwashers, and effective tips for using a dishwasher.

If you are considering buying a dishwasher but still have doubts over its usefulness, know the benefits of using a dishwasher in your kitchen.

• The performance of the dishwasher in cleaning the dishes is way better than washing the dishes manually. It features different settings that allow you to remove even hard and stubborn stains from your vessels. Being an appliance, its cleaning efficiency exceeds manual washing.

• Using a dishwasher in your kitchen helps you to conserve the environment as it saves water. It consumes approx one-tenth of water as compared to manual dishwashing by hands.

• The dishwasher not only cleans the utensils but also kills the germs while washing the utensils. It provides hygienic cleaning as it uses warm water for washing the utensils.

• A dishwasher requires a one-time investment, but it offers an impressive cost to benefit ratio. A branded dishwasher may serve you for at least 10 years and allow you to recover the costs many times over.

• Some advanced models of dishwashers come with customized options that allow you to clean pots and pans with hardened stains.

• Using a dishwasher saves you lots of time and labour every day. You don’t have to spend hours standing near the kitchen sink for washing your utensils. Instead, you can utilize that time for completing other personal or professional tasks.

Let’s discuss the various common dishes that you can load and wash in a dishwasher.

• Steel milk vessel with the layered bottom (ensure that you don’t let your milk get burnt or hardened in the sides of the vessel)

• Ceramic cups, steel tumbler, and glass cup

• Metal strainer being used for filtering tea or other dishes

• Steel vessels with layered bottom such as sambar boiling vessel, breakfast plates, lunch plates, etc. (ensure that you don’t have burnt sides or bottom as it may require manual scrubbing)

• Lunch boxes, dinner plates, knives, spoons, cooking or serving utensils, curd vessel, dishwasher safe water bottles

• Glass salt container, steel oil containers, steel and dishwasher safe grocery boxes for storage, steel spices boxes for storing spices

• Steel rack for stacking veggies like potato, onion, tomato, garlic and many others

A dishwasher comes with the upper rack and lower rack. Use the upper rack for keeping small vessels like coffee cups, knives, spoons, smaller bowels, etc. Use the lower rack for keeping larger vessels like plates, boxes, milk vessels, etc.

Materials that can be loaded in dishwashers

• Steel
• Glass
• Porcelain
• Dishwasher safe ceramic ware
• Dishwasher safe plastics

Materials that cannot be loaded in a dishwasher

• Aluminium and indolium (Vessels made of these materials turn black in patches if they are washed in a dishwasher)
• Iron (Avoid cleaning your cast iron pans, dosa pans and iron Kadai in a dishwasher)
• Wood (Don’t load wooden bowls, wooden spatulas, bamboo bowls, wooden utensils in your dishwasher)
• Copper
• Brass
• Vessels with the copper bottom (If you wash them in a dishwasher, the copper coating gets eroded)
• Hard anodized cookware (if washed in a dishwasher, it loses its shine, and the black material gets dull and rough)
• Plastics vessels that are not dishwasher safe (Ensure that your plastic vessels/containers are dishwasher safe before loading them in your dishwasher)

Thus, you can’t load every utensil or vessel used in your Indian kitchen in your dishwasher.

You may still require washing a few vessels like your greasy Kadai with your hands. Some dishwasher brands provide customized options for cleaning highly greasy Kadai.

A dishwasher cycle runs for around two and a half hours. You can also run a dishwasher for smaller cycles for vessels that are not too soiled. Even after using the dishwasher daily, you don’t observe any sharp fluctuation in your electricity bills.

Your dishwasher consumes electricity similarly to your washing machine. However, it does not contribute to any noticeable spike or increase in your power consumption.

You can extract the maximum advantage out of your dishwasher and ensure its long-lasting usage by following the below-mentioned tips.

• Ensure to scrape off the excess food pieces before loading your vessels in a dishwasher.
• Load your dishes and vessels in such a way to allow the water to run off freely.
• Follow your manufacturer’s instructions regarding the loading and sorting of your dishes. This ensures the optimal and uniform circulation of water to all the vessels.
• Depending on your cleaning workload, increase the settings of rinse and storage as required.
• When you load large items like panhandles or oversized utensils, these may block the sprayer arms. Thus, before you run the dishwasher cleaning cycle, ensure to spin the sprayer arms. This confirms that the sprayer arms can rotate and spray water freely.
• Always use high-quality detergent and avoid damp or old detergent as it may limit the cleaning efficiency of your dishwasher.
• Ensure to use the correct detergent dosages. Again, it’s better to read and follow the detergent pack instructions beforehand.
• Regularly clean and remove filters at frequent intervals.
• Use high-quality dishwasher cleaner once a month for cleaning the build-up of grease and lime scales.
• You need not pre-rinse dishes by hand before loading them in your dishwasher.
• While loading the dishes in your dishwasher, ensure to leave room for water to circulate.
• To maintain the cleaning efficiency of your dishwasher, ensure to check and clean the rubber seals, drains, sprayer arms, filters, etc; at regular intervals.
• Run your dishwasher at normal or auto-wash cycle.
• Make adjustments in the rinse setting of your dishwasher as per the hardness of local water.