The goal of an approach to dishes is to facilitate lifestyle and cleanliness without compromising time and effort unduly... here is the approach that I developed after several years of living mostly alone while going to school and working, allowing me to cook frequently (1-3x/day) and maintain a clean house (defined as freedom from any amount of cultivation of life-forms, visual unsightliness, scents, and impediments of use of facilities).
- have enough dishes of the basic sorts (plates, cuts, cutlery) to eat for several meals without running-out (3-5 of each per person)
- have enough counter-space or a big enough dish-bin to accommodate several meals worth of basic dishes, not tools
- have a good drying rack system that can accommodate a large load of drying dishes
- have adequate cleaning tools, soap, hot water, dish gloves, and linens on-hand at all times (recommend thick gloves for washing in very hot water, green scrubbies, a dish brush, a bottle brush, steel wool, and unscented detergent-type dish soap; recommend against sponges and dish rags, as they harbour bacteria - though the small dish rag may be used for a day and laundered, it is not a tool though, it is a daily linen)
- have a soaking bucket, or a double-sink
- have adequate linens for a week or more (recommend lint-free cotton surgical huck towels, and some form of smaller, quick-drying wet-rag such as Church-lady crocheted semi-synthetic, or thin micro-fibre), and a hamper for these rags at-hand
- have a strainer at the sink for collecting non-flushable-sized food particulates when rinsing dishes/pots-pans; a hands-free strainer is highly recommended, whether a chinois that you can prop-up in the drain, or whatever works... this should live on the side of the sink, not constantly in the bottom of the sink (elaborated-on later)
- one person operation, minimal time and effort... thus, cut-out hand-drying unless absolutely necessary (air-drying is also typically cleaner)
- never compromise functional use of the kitchen facilities
- permit ample laziness with maximum cleanliness
- limit breeding grounds (anywhere that has moisture, lack of air-flow, time, and food particulates)
- the sink shall always be clean
The logic of this stems from the idea that the sink is the dirtiest part of the kitchen, often, so keeping it clean will result in everything else being cleaner. Further, there are many functional advantages to having a clean sink: it is a primary working location for cooking and cleaning, and it's use and access should not be impeded. To have a dirty sink, especially with any objects in it for holding, is to render useless your most important tool in the kitchen.
- all service-wares (defined as the things you eat/drink with or on) must be rinsed after use, before being stacked or put into the dish bin and set-aside; rinsed to the point of their being clean enough to be left for a week with no chance of scent, mould, fungus, or bug/animal life being attracted and harboured; also clean to the point of being able to be used again if no-one is looking)
- all tools that there are not multiples of (defined as pots, pans, knives, spatulas) must be washed fully immediately around the time of the meal and set to dry in the drying rack (light tools) or on the stove-top (pots/pans and heavy tools), or hand dried and put-away (knives); keeping enough of these around for stacking would be space and cost prohibitive, and these are usually dirtier than service-ware dishes
- the drying rack should be treated not as an ongoing place for dishes to dry, but as a binary... when there are wet dishes, it is okay to add more; when there are dry dishes, they must all be put-away before any dishes are done, even tools/pottery/etc. (unless these are hand-dried and do not go into the drying rack at all)
These help preserve service-wares and tools longevity, allowing more-so for the use of nice-dishes constantly; or, to fine-tune the cleanliness.
- dry pots and pans, or other heavy objects on the stove-top; heavy items should not be mixed with service-wares, in order to minimize risk of breaking pottery and glasses
- knives should be in a knife-block or on a wall-magnet, not in a drawer where they will dull (unless in sheaths)
- cutlery should point upwards when drying, except for pointed knives (steak knives)
- rinse dishes in very hot water (they will then dry quicker, and be cleaner of detergent residue and bacteria)
- the kitchen-sink strainer, if you're using a small drain-seated strainer, should live on the side of the sink (clean, and in the draining tool bin), not always in the bottom of the sink, because most food particulates can go down a drain without problems, except for the larger ones accumulated at the time of dish-scraping or fridge clean-outs... keeping the strainer in the sink translates into a wet container for food particulates, which is prime territory for bacteria, etc. -- the kitchen strainer, if used as a sort of compost-collector, must have air-flow and drainage... I use mine like in this fashion; I have a chinois hanging on a hook, and it's tip rests on the inside lip of the sink, so I can one-handed pour coffee grinds into it (at the right angle) and it drains into the sink, or I can throw peels into it and leave them there until it's full
- the best dishes are usually tough ones for daily use, white ceramic plates and bowls, stainless steel cutlery, thick glassware and mugs... throw-away any chipped plates, and buy cheap and ubiquitous
- the nice dishes should be washed immediately, without dish gloves on, and put to dry immediately, to minimize damage-risk... they should be handled individually, rather than in batches, like the regular dishes are... this includes pottery and stem-ware -- common breaking-points for these are in batch-washing, and in putting them down in the sink at any point, which is one advantage of a plastic dish-bin, or in removing them singularly from a drying stack, rather than putting-away all the dishes in the drying stack at once
- no sharp-knives in the dish bin (butter/dinner knives are acceptable) -- this is a common way people get seriously cut in the kitchen, when they reach into a dish bin and grab a knife by the blade, or are stabbed by an askew knife in a soapy-water dish-bin
- if the dish-drying mat is accumulating mould within a week, the dishes are not clean enough when they are being put to dry - also, older rubber dish mats may have cracks that harbour mould and allow it to return sooner; so, replace old dish-drying drip-mats regularly
- home economics classes - note: I won the Foods Studies awards in grades 11 & 12
- Martha Stewart's "Housekeeping Handbook" (an indispensable book in proper home-economics)
- Mom's education and standards (no, I was not raised in a barn)
- "You Need To Wash Your Towels More Often Than You Think. Here's Why." (Suzy Strutner, Huffington Post, 10/16/2014)
- working in cafes, restaurants, and bars for 16 years
- "The 4-Hour Chef" (Tim Ferriss; pub. New Harvest, 2012)
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