I love my 12 yr old Kitchen Aid. It is so logical how to load the dishes. Even my engineer-to-be grandson thinks so! I do rinse my dishes as I only run the dishwasher about once weekly and it would be smelly and dried on if I did not.

Two dishwashers has been the best thing in our kitchen remodel a few years ago.

Regardless of advice not to rinse, my dishes are free of food when they enter the dishwasher. All I need is a scalding hot wash, rinse and heated drying cycle for sanitation. So when I went to replace my dishwasher, I asked for one with an express wash and heated dry cycle. American manufacturers don't offer short wash cycles. European manufacturers consider the drying cycle a waste of energy and don't offer those. So I had to choose. Decided on a Bosch with an express cycle that signals when done. Just need to open it to allow for air dry. The Bosch produces dishes too hot to handle so I am comfortable they are sanitized. Very low dBA so I am a happy camper.

Loading the dishwasher is my OCD. I load from back to front largest to smallest, grouping like items. Same with utensils and glasses making unloading a smooth and quick grab and go .

Have a drawer style dishwasher. Can't figure out how to load bowls. Mine don't fit right. Any ideas?

Bosch is best. Finish power ball detergent. we run every night whether full or half full, there is just the two of us and we cook almost every night. empty every morning. rarely hand wash. :)

I like to incorportate exercise while loading and unloading dishes. Try doing squats while loading the bottom part and stretching on toes while unloading the top rack. Hold each position for 5 to 10 seconds. Sounds crazy, but its a great way to fit in (at least) 15 min of your time burning calories while cleaning up. Believe me, this will motivate you too.

Always scrape and rinse before loading per my spouse's instructions. Evidently even though the dishwashers have a built in disposal they are nothing like the ones in the sink. Since he's a plumber and stuck doing any repair I listen to him.
Also he's the official knife sharpener so those get hand washed (evidently the dishwasher dulls the edge)

I load all the plates, small and large, in the same area. All plastics and little glass bowls go towards the back. Cups go on the top rack with large utensils, and silverware is handle down in the basket. Pots and pans are hand washed. I also rise and scrape all dishes before loading them- we are renting now, so I cant wait to get a new place and get a nicer dishwasher!

After arguing all these years with hubby about the right way to do it I just let him do it himself. Easy peasy!

Bowls and cups on top, big dishes in the back, and silverwear facing up in the drawer grouped together with like items. Sharp knives should be hand-washed anyway! I can't wait to get my hands on a drawer-type washer though!

I agree with those who don't overload. I have no plan. I only want the pieces to face the water. Make it easy for myself by not bending over again and again to load or unload.

We recently bought a Bosch....best dishwasher I've ever had!! (and that's after using dishwashers for over 40 years...)

I am married to a Chemical Engineer. He retired before I did so he took over the houseduties while I went to work; it was heaven. He rinses all the dishes clean Before he loads dishwasher and says, The protein in the foods makes it difficult to clean so I jsut help it along. I just say thank you!

good woman. he can't hurt anything. He sounds sweet

Don't rinse! My brother is an appliance electrician and he says the modern dishwashing soaps are so well designed that, if there's no food on plates to be removed, the soap will start to eat away at your china's surface. We have a 10-year-old Miele and we've never rinsed dishes. It's still working brilliantly. Sometimes I get down on the floor and kiss it I love it so much

After 21 years of marriage I've finally (duh) figured out that my husband was purposely loading the dishwasher wrong just so I would start loading it myself. It worked. But.... Now I pretend I don't see the full dishwasher that needs unloading so that he will empty it. Sometimes it works, but now he is putting dishes in the wrong place so that I will always do the unloading. I give up....he wins.

@maupas, now you pretend you can't find the dishes so you can't cook/serve dinner. HA!

Buy a Miele (with the cutlery drawer), follow the loading pattern ( yes, there is such a thing - thank you German engineers/designers) - done. Love it ...every day.

Rinsing? Nope, that's why you have a dishwasher . Scrape the food off...load...done.

one tip, if you happen to have dishes with a gold rim or hand wash only, load, 1 drop and I mean one drop of normal dish detergent , run on china/crystal cycle. Dishes are clean, Gold stays on, Machine seems to tolerate it.

Did I say I love Miele??? :)

Make sure you are cleaning out the little filter in the bottom every week if you have one!

For all those comment on Engineers .... Whats up My P.Eng can't change a light or close a cupboard but I trust his expertise to run Million $ Projects just don't let him touch anything domestic LOL

My Dishwasher strategy is "if it can't be washed in the DW I don't own it"

We gave up having dishwashers years ago. My better half and I enjoy doing the dishes by hand. We like the time together talking, laughing, making plans, talking about our day..... and a wet towel snap never grows old, just keeps you young :)

I have a Bosch. As much as one can live a dishwasher, I love it! The 3rd rack is great for larger utensils too. It is super quite too. It has red light that shines on the floor when on because it makes zero noise.

WE purchased a Fisher Paytel with two drawers and love it. Dishes and tableware on top, baking dishes and pots on the bottom. Neat fold down ledges hold the pet dishes and glasses stand underneath.

I load it when the dogs are outside!

I don't know why anyone loves the flatware shelf that comes with some foreign dishwashers. I owned a Miele for 10 years and everyday I hated the fact that I had to lay out, one by one, every fork, knife, and spoon. This was clearly designed for people with OCD. I do have to say that the machine was so quiet, I would check to see if it was actually running.

When I moved two years ago, the house came with a GE Profile. I loved the flatware basket and being able to grab a handful of forks and dropping them in. I will admit that the Miele cleaned better than the GE and I don't really appreciate hearing every swish from the GE even when I'm in another room.

I like the idea of running the dishwasher every evening instead of waiting two or three days for it to fill. My only hesitation is that we live in the desert and we're acutely aware of the need to conserve water.

Asko !!! the wine glasses dont have any room except reallysideways, and the rims other dishes. Only holds about three or four. Why doesn't someone invent a stand=up wine glass holder for the bottom of the dishwasher in the area where you can flatten the holders down??? Very disappointed. It seems to be built for a lot of teacups and saucers, which aren't used as much anymore. My old GE was a workhorse, and I could do the stemware in multiples.

I have a 16 year old Maytag with bent tines that are now hard to find and it still works great. I load everything (when possible) facing center, like items together; bowls, plates, cups, etc. I believe everything comes out cleaner, you can put more items in, and it's more efficient to unload. I use the utensil basket, putting in facing up AND down. Just wash my hands before handling clean ones when emptying. I do not put in good (expensive) knives as they will get dull and the handles will get ruined. I also put in the veggie brush and Dobie scrubbing pad to clean and sanitize. My husband is well trained to correctly load too.

I married a Clinical scientist.
I did the same messy dish loading! He has done the loading for 42 years!

My Bosch has the 3rd rack and a traditional utensil basket. I use 3rd for big utensils like spatulas, tongs, whisks, etc

My Mother often quoted this:" She has a dish washer, new and shiny! I have two --twelve years old and kind of whiny!" (I'm a twin! Think she was referencing twin and me!)

My family just smiles and says, "Just let mom do it. She'll has her own special way to load the dishwasher." I'm happy with that and so are they! Lol Now, if I could just get someone to unload it...there's no trick to that!

I am shocked to read comments praising Bosch. I loved how quiet it was, but the dishes did not come clean and the electronics gave out quickly.

Buy dishes that actually fit in the provided spaces.

If you are right handed put the dishwasher on the left side of the sink so that when you are wiping a dish with your right hand dish in the left before putting it in the washer it is one clean motion to put it in its place on the rack.

An appliance repair man for 27 yrs, shared his wisdom with me. Do not put the soap pod in the soap dispenser. Put it in the bottom front left corner. It will begin to dissolve immediately, as it should for optimum cleaning. In a closed dispenser it is released too late in the cycle and leaves a residue and spots on glasses. I have done it this way ever since and no water spots.

There absolutely is a right way to load a dishwasher, and for years I was the champ at getting every last thing in before it ran. But after I became wheelchair bound, the dishwasher became a challenge, so my hubby took over. I would cringe and complain and get annoyed about how he did it. Finally, I just "let it go". He's in charge of it, he does it his way, so that's the right way around here!

When we renovated, we installed our Miele dishwasher 15 inches above the floor and added a drawer under it. No more bending over to load and unload our dishes and we use the drawer underneath to store items that do not go in the dishwasher.

is that the bottom left corner of the door or in the well of the machine.

I always place the forks, knives and spoons in their own place. Knives face down, forks and spoons face up. Take them out, no sorting necessary then place them in the drawer. Place sponge in, too. Sprinkle baking soda in to freshen d/w. PS: I only have one dishwasher.

@pattipace888 - don't your spoons stick together? Mine sure did. I stopped putting them together because they never got clean. If they are tongs up, then you have to handle the part where you eat before you put them into your silverware drawer/storage. Nope, not for me! I'm putting mine tongs down in the basket.

In the well of the machine

These comments are fun to read. Knives, Teflon, wooden handles, aluminum are never put in our dishwasher for most of the reasons already posted. We loved our Kitchen Aid from another house where we had a sewer system. We installed it because of the stainless steel interior. This house has a septic, so most food debris is scraped off but I still don't rinse. Pots and pans are always washed by hand. The guys leave the loading up to me but they will stick dishes in the washer and I organize later. No big deal.

Have at least one kid...then you don't have to worry about the dishes until the go off to college.

Bought a Bosch about five years ago. We have an open concept great room and kitchen with high ceilings, hardwood floors and 3 walls of glass. Our old dishwasher was so noisy we couldn't hear on the phone or to watch TV. We bought the Bosch because it was suppose to be quiet. It started out very quiet but seems less so lately. However it does a great job cleaning.

We kept the old dishwasher from the kitchen before the remodel and just slid a new wooden panel in the front to match the kitchen cupboards. It was an old standard Kenmore with one or two settings and sounded like a freight train when it ran, but it never broke down and we only ran it over night. We also bought a new SS Bosch super quiet top of the line model that ran so quiet and had hidden panel on inside, you had to touch the door to feel if it was actually running. Both worked very well. I loved having two dishwashers, and not having to dish double the $$ for more than one machine. When we had guests over it came in very handy. We are a family of 6 so on the weekends, both were pretty full when they ran before bed. I will tell you before I purchased the Bosch we tried the Miele having that top rack for the utensils. I hated that thing with a passion! It was a pain to load and even more of a pain to unload, the Miele couldn't hold a candle to being as quiet as the Bosch. Glad I changed it out for the Bosch. We placed the older dishwasher on the island beside the prep sink, the other opposite the double sink being that it was in view and the newer of the two, also making it easier for loading, especially during parties.

@ homestaymom1:. There are actually wine glass holder for the bottom rack. Google dishwasher wine glass holder, and you will find it. There is ne made byBosch, and I believe it will work well in Asko

No one here has mentioned Whirlpool. I am so sold on their appliances, it's all I will buy. Kenmore is made by Whirlpool.

When we moved into our house 2 and a half years ago, there was a brand new Whirlpool dishwasher waiting to be hooked up. I was thrilled after living in an apartment where we had NO counter space and hand washed everything for over 5 years with sulfury smelling water. Once I began using the new dishwasher, I realized it was a bottom-of-the-line cheap replacement to the old one that was on the porch when we moved in. I could never understand the design of that dishwasher and how the dishes were supposed to fit. Couldn't wait to replace it.

So we bought a new one and just had it installed 2 weeks ago along with a new sink and faucet (I am loving this redesigned kitchen space!). Now I don't like the new one because I can't fit the dishes in the way I used to! Guess there is no pleasing me, LOL.

Don't like the stainless steel interior because it's so dark inside I can't see what I'm doing (old one was white). Don't like the larger spaces on the top rack because the dishes don't fit the same way and the tines move funny and seem flimsy.

LOVE the silverware basket that fits into the door, which the old one didn't have and the dishwashers we had in other places did. LOVE the fact that it's so quiet I have to check twice to see if it's running. LOVE the fact that it's bigger inside and that it seems better insulated than the old one. Especially LOVE the fact that it doesn't rock back and forth when you pull the racks out because it's been installed correctly!!! That was driving me crazy with the old one. Hubby tried to anchor it but then I fell over it when it was open and it couldn't be re-anchored.

And I LOVE my new huge deep sink (one bowl, with 3 removable components: a portable smaller sink/dishpan with drainer, colander, and cutting board that all fit into the ridges around the edge of the sink). They sell this at Lowe's and it's marvelous. Then I chose a very tall restaurant-style faucet with a sprayer extended on a spring over everything that swings across the entire sink area.

It should be mentioned that the dishwasher and the sink area go together as a package deal, and how you like one of the components may be affected by the other. It should also be mentioned that not liking either of them can cause frustration and depression and affect your overall diet. Processing fresh veggies is a breeze with my new system and I was thrilled at how easy it was to do Thanksgiving with a huge sink that fit the whole roaster pan. I have never been able to do that before, having only had small divided sinks!

I really do need to sit down and read the dishwasher manual -- haven't done that yet or explored all the features! Thanks for the advice everyone!!!

if you have large flat cookie sheets or cutting boards place them on the top rack on top of you glasses. or whatever . just do not cover up the middle bottom jers.