Recently I have had the unfortunate luck of my dishwasher breaking. Since my family is in the middle of this horrible economy with everyone else, we have reverted back 50 years and are can you wash dishes with cold water all our dishes by hand. Wow, do you have any idea how painful that is, especially after having a dish washer most of my life?
Have you ever noticed that some people have a tendency to get their dishes sparkling clean while others leave small bits of food and gunk behind? There are tricks to getting this done and with a little help you can accomplish this too.
First of all completely clear both sinks, scrub them down with dish soap to make sure your surface area is clean. Then put the stopper in the left sink, left because I am OCD and that is how it is done. Start to fill with HOT water, not mildly hot, not warm, I mean excruciatingly painful, my skin is going to fall off Hot. Next add soap.
Now as you add the soap gently agitate the water to create bubbles. The spray nozzle works well but can create more bubbles than you want. If that happens, let your kids come and play with the bubbles for a while and they will disappear quickly. After you have an even amount of bubbles versus water move the faucet to the other sink
Now you have a choice here. There are many things that you can use to scrub the dishes with, a sponge, a can you wash dishes with cold water rag, steel wool, stainless steel cleaner, one of those refillable sponge things. This is your choice however from an OCD standpoint you want the cleanest thing possible, DEFINITELY not a sponge. My top choice is a clean wash cloth that I buy in bulk. I get them in white so I can see the dirt. Pull a nice clean sterilized can you wash dishes with cold water cloth out of your neatly stacked drawer and dunk it in the soapy hot water. Now you sufficiently have a very clean object to clean with.
Take each dish, plate, cup, bowl, whatever and place in the empty sink, one at a time. Now here is the part that I am EXTREMELY particular about. Rinse the dish. I don't mean just get the big stuff off, I mean rinse every single crumb and speck of food off of it. If it doesn't rinse off scrub it off! You want your dishes shining before you put them into that soapy water. You would not want to make your soapy water dirty, right? As you rinse each dish put them in the sterilizing water and scrub again.
The sink that was just used to rinse dishes off in now needs cleaned again. Scrub it with dish soap and completely rinse. Next move your now extremely clean dishes into that sink and rinse. As you rinse make sure every bit of soap suds are completely rinsed off the dish. Make sure you move the dish under the water at least twice to rinse every angle. 4 is better than 2 but definitely not go with 3 times. Now place your dish into a drain rack. I am assuming at this point your drain rack recently has been scrubbed clean with the appropriate cleaning supplies and is ready for dish placement.
Continue with this until the sink is empty. If you had more dishes than would fit in the sink at a time make sure you can you wash dishes with cold waterh in batches. Don't forget to re-clean the sink after rinsing the food infested dishes. After you have washed every dish to satisfaction, take your soapy wash cloth and scrub down the counters, table, stove, etc. Of course rinsing and cleaning before using on each surface.
Now return to the sink and drain the water. As the water is draining scrub the sink, the faucet, the handle, and anything else that looks like it could possibly be hiding any of those evil germs. Once the water is gone and the sink AREA is clean take your can you wash dishes with cold water cloth and place it in the laundry room to dry and be re-washed.