For the dishwasherless, servantless Indian people. Hahaha, I stole it from Julia and I admit.

We are probably going to enter Lockdown 4.0 and it’s started to suck a bit. The basket of positivity is running thin – much like my patience- and I am starting to talk to utensils for being stubborn with stains. Situation is grim fellas. But we still have some stash of happiness in the Trumatterstyle basket and we will use that till it last.

Bringing to you this day, from the depths of sink hell, the dishwashing technique that saved my life and if you don’t have a dishwasher it’ll save yours.

Now some of you may already know this and do this and for you lot- man! Wise o wise. As for me, I had Pramila. She was literally the fuel and she used to do everything and I quite never had to. But now that she is at home we must step in and do the chores. It’s all fine really! As my husband would say- “in pursuit of the complete life”.

But complete life can be done with a bit of ease eh? So here are the top 5 tips to effective and painless dishwashing. It’s time to say goodbye to the himalaya that’s building in your sink! And surprisingly, most of the things that need doing is actually before the actual washing.

Organization is key

When you enter into the kitchen, have an idea of what you are going to cook. Take the ingredients out in a tray or keep it at the counter top. Open the lids and let it sit. Take out one spoon for wet and one for dry ingredients. Take out the utensil you are going to cook in. Keep it all handy. Why? Because when you are in a rush you tend to use a lot more utensil. Then touch stuff with wet hands and those need cleaning before you can keep it back on the shelf. Not to mention, the massive irritability factor of not finding things is a major no no.

Manage time well: Cook and clean. And not cook and clean later

Chop and clean the counter. Taste and clean the spoon. Boil, drain and use the boiling vessel to cook. If you cook and clean, you will need a lot less utensils. Imagine if you have to adjust salt thrice and have 3 spoons in the sink and you cook 3 dishes per meal how many spoons are you washing? Plus, if you are cooking and cleaning your kitchen time reduces to half because when the rice or curry cooks, you can wash the dishes. Other than waiting for it to finish and then adding an extra half an hour to your kitchen time.

Plus, if you let it pile and would want to do it later, trust me you will lose steam and going back for just the dishes will be quite a task. Do it all as you are in the kitchen

Double duty: Make vessels work for more than a dish

One vessel one dish? Man you are in trouble. Adapt yourself and your recipes in a way that requires less vessel. For example?

Let’s take mutton curry as an example.

Vessels: A big bowl, colander and pressure cooker.

Wash mutton in colander, pressure cook in cooker, meanwhile wash colander. Strain mutton in colander and keep a bowl below. Use the same cooker to add oil and spices. Use the water from the bowl to add to mutton while cooking and once done, use the same bowl to store mutton in the fridge. Between a colander and a pan, you can do the bulk load. So what are you washing? A colander and a pressure cooker.

Rinse and keep. Segregate and wash

Dishwashing can be made slightly easy, if you segregate.

If you have wood, steel and glass in the sink, segregate. On your counter side keep everything in batches of materials and arranged. Why? Because you will wash similar things at the same time and we mostly keep similar things at similar places.

Because some will need steel wool, some will need less pressure, some will need a little more soaking. Plus when you wipe and keep, you can literally do one batch at a time and keep them back in their place, so nothing tumbles and breaks.

I do the ceramic first, then the glasses, then pots and pans which by then have soaked a little.

Also, if you are in the habit of just chucking plates in the sink, you deserve this. Rinse your plate well before sink time. It’ll make your work incredibly less boring.

And here’s to avoiding dishwashing backpains

Sometimes the kitchen sink is terribly low and dishwashing constantly gives you back pain. So what you do is, you don’t wash directly from the sink at all. Back to point 4 and a bowl of water with liquid soap on the counter. Wash, rinse and keep, all on the counter.

After each wash, wash the scrubber, steel wool and the bowl and Stash it to its place. It might seem a little too much work but believe me you, it’ll save your life. Just like it has saved mine!

Bom Dia. I’ll brew myself a cuppa.

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