Another dish-washing question

[vilakins]

I should have added this to the last post, sorry, but I thought of it a bit late.

This is for people from the UK. Why do you wash dishes in a plastic bowl in the sink rather than directly in the sink? Is it to save water, to keep the sink clean, to be able to toss debris over the side, to protect dishes from hard metal, or for some other reason?

Just so people know my dish-washing habits, I rinse dishes to get loose food off and put them in the dishwasher. I wash delicate glassware (only used for dinner parties or special occasions) in the sink with a microfibre cloth, and pots and pans with a brush which goes through the dishwasher when it needs it. I dry any hand-washed dishes with a tea towel, and no, I don't know why it's called that. "Dish towel", as cited by an American, makes more sense.

The only reason I'm asking about dish washing is because of seeing so many knitted dish cloths on a knitting site and community. It's not normally a subject that exerts any fascination. :-P

Comments

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

I've mainly seen them using the bowl in the sink.

We had two sinks too, and they were great. We only have one here, but new houses tend to have two, one with a waste disposal.

[jhall1.livejournal.com]

I don't have a dishwasher, and I use the "bowl in the sink" method. I've never thought about why, but it's what my parents always did and I just assumed that it was how things were done. It does save on the amount of hot water and washing-up liquid used compared to doing it in the sink, and it also doesn't take so long to get the water to a usable depth.

(But if I only have a few not very dirty items that won't require washing-up liquid to get clean, then I just rinse them under the hot tap and don't use a bowl.)