Turkey tub suds
Wednesday, February 3, 2010 at 9:50PM
Our little plumbing mishap this week has me getting crafty with the chores. Though my first instinct with dishes is don’t do them at all, my better judgement (and sweet J) tells me that life must go on with or without a kitchen sink sewage pipe.
Tonight, our third night of improvised dish tub action, it seems almost charming, intentional. I feel a twinge of connection to my pioneer woman self to be using a turkey roasting pot as an impromptu dish tub. Long day on the snowy prairie, and now home for me, delving into the sudsy labor of returning the house to “ready-to-cook”, as opposed to “my-oh-my-look-at-all-the-dishes-the-happy-life-makes”.
I realized that not everyone grew up in a dish tub (vs dishwasher) house, or not everyone worked in a coffeeshop or bar where the fancy dish tub system prevails.
Ladies, pull out your dish tubs, we’re sudsing up the old fashioned way—when they went without running water or indoor plumbing. And for those of you hip ladies and gents who do this already, all the time, please do share some tips and secrets with the rest of us.
How to do the dishes, dish tub style:
Step 1: fill dish tub-like object with hot water and a few squirts of dish soap.As you work your way through soaping up each dish, just set them on the counter somewhere next to the sink in preparation for the rinse bath. Try to keep your suds bath relatively clean by scraping food remnants into the trash before plopping plates in the water, or dumping out pre-soak water from cups or bowls before you dunk them in the suds.
Once all your dishes have been sudsed, pitch out the soapy water, rinse the container or dish tub and fill with hot/warm water for the rinse cycle. If we were really fancy, we’d have two rinses. One warm and one cold. I’m lazy and tired of standing at the sink. One rinse will do for me.
Soap residue galaxy formation: The Soapy Way?I create a little friction, aka give the dish a good slosh during the rinse so that soap suds don’t cling to the dish as I pull it out of the water.
Although my kitchen drain pipe is missing right now (and has no apparent ETA for a reappearance), I still thankfully have running water. And, to be fair, my bathtub drain (covered with a drain net thingy) is ready to receive my used suds and rinse water, so I’m not pitching it out off the porch like a real pioneer lady.
I’ll be glad to have my drain pipe back, a truly under-recognized asset that I’ve happily taken for granted (until now, scraping out every piece of leftover grit from a day’s worth of food from a tiny metal sieve.)
This thought-inducing method also reminds me that dish tub washing/rinsing is a much more water-efficient method (than letting the water run while you suds and then rinse) when you have a lot of wash-by-hand dishes, or no dishwasher (like us). Your grandchildren will appreciate those considerations now as it looks like potable water is going to be in high demand for them.
Reader Comments (4)
As a girl who grew up in a "dish tub" family, I can definitely appreciate what you're getting at here. Although I've abandoned the method for the more wasteful running water method, this has me thinking about REthinking my habits. Sure, I've got a kitchen sewer drain -- but I also have a brain. Wouldn't be a bad idea to start thinking a bit more about my frivolous water usage.
I must admit, Lo, that I too got comfy with that nice warm water stream while I suds and rinse. There's a happy medium for us in here somewhere (if pulling out the ol' tub isn't suitable, or if we have just a few dishes, not worthy of a whole tub).
I started a new thing where I clean one bigger bowl or pot and use it as a suds water stash to dip in and clean my sponge. That usually keeps the water off until all the dishes are ready to be rinsed together. Thanks for the note!
I don't have a dishwasher here, and wash my dishes using a "two plastic dishpan" method.(If we had a double sink, I could just fill each side, the two small dishpans just fit in our tiny sink) One pan is hot soapy water, and the other is hot rinse water, and the dishes make a steady progress from where they are stacked on one side of the sink, through each pan in turn.
After I scrub each dirty dish clean, I then dunk it quickly up and down as vertically as possible in the soapy water, which allows most of the soap to slide off into the pan, before it goes into the rinse water. If there are enough dishes that the soapy water eventually gets "gross", it gets dumped and with the addition of a bit more soap, the now-slightly-soapy rinse water becomes the washing water, and fresh rinse water fills the old wash-water pan Once rinsed the dishes are stacked in the drying rack.
I developed this system of washing years ago when I lived in a cabin in N Idaho without a well, and have used it ever since. (There is nothing like bringing your water home in 5 gallon buckets on the back of a sled to get you to learn how to conserve!)
Alison, what a great idea to use the slightly soapy rinse water tub as your new suds tub when the other one gets gross. After reading The Poisonwood Bible, by Barbara Kingsolver, I realized how much I take running water for granted! The family in the book lives in the Congo and must first tote, and then boil all the water they use both for cooking and dishes. Wow, buckets on a sled! Thanks for sharing.