Homemade dishwasher detergents

Home made dishwasher soap? Well cheap off store brands can be affordable but still not as good as Cascade. Recently I switched from being a finish/Electrasol user to being a Cascade user because it did a better job, but both are costly unless you coupon and get a box of it for 84¢…

So here are some dishwasher detergent recipes I found and some I tried.

Most environment friendly was this recipe:

1 teaspoon dawn Dishsoap
1/2 cup white vinegar

OR

2 teaspoons dish soap
8 ounces white vinegar

I used my favorite dawn dish soap, the five minute soak with overnight soak action and bleach alternative. I stirred this mixture and it became a cloudly white, and used the measuring spoon to stir to make sure I got all the soap I could without wasting it.  I hardly smelled the vinegar and filled both areas of the dishwasher and shut the latch. I started this with plates that I usually do not scrub clean and some I did. Now if it does a great job on cheese I will no longer be buying cascade.  And just so you know with couponing you can get dawn soap for at least 50¢ so this can be very cheap.  There were no soap suds on my floor. You can smell it a little and it just smells clean. It managed to take off the cheese inbetween the fork prongs and on the plates... It did not remove melted butter on my non-stick frying pan, but everything else was clean. I got the same results as Cascade for way less. I usually scrub down my pots and pans before sticking them in the Dishwasher.

I tried modifying a recipe:

1/2 cup borax
1/2 cup washing soda
1/4 cup Epsom salt
1 teaspoon dawn liquid soap

I stirred this dry mix very well til it looked like I had blue flakes. It did a great job of scrubbing my dishes clean and left a very nice shine. I filled up both the spots in my dishwasher like normal and had no issues. Many people use citric acid instead of the salt. If you preclean your dishes using citric acid is not necessary. Citric acid can be found in one of the little green and white bottles for helping to keep fruits fresh in the canning section at Walmart. Look for the amount of Vitamin C and you will see it is very high. It smells like dishwasher detergent and looks like it. I keep this in an old yogurt container. If you need a measurement use two table spoons. Epsom salt can be found at the dollar store or any store.  You can subsitute washing soda with baking soda and use 1/2 cup vinegar in the bottom of your wash load prior to starting the load and your dishes will shine. I think I am going to stick to this recipe because I usually have these items on hand.

I modified this recipe above again adding dishwasher magic to my cup of borax. I put about 1cm of dishwasher magic in a measuring cup and then filled it with borax.  I noticed my dishwasher did not sound like I lived by an airport or had high pitched whistling during the wash cycles. So probably about 1/4 of a cup of dishwasher magic, and 3/4 of a cup borax. I also used the orange antibacterial dish soap. Hope this is helpful.

I used to use this recipe:

1:1 of borax and baking soda.

I do not recommend this as it doesn't clean very well.

Recipe for a few months-1year

1 box borax (76 oz)
1 box Washing soda (55 oz)
2 cups Espom Salt
1 container of Ball canning "Fruit Fresh" (5 oz)
1/4 cup of Dish washer magic
3/4 bottle of Dawn liquid dish soap (9 fl oz)

Make sure you stir very well to get the dish soap to be flaky. You will find you make a nice amount for about the cost of maybe near $10.

I use one heaping Table spoon.

Here are other recipes with more detail:

http://americanpreppersnetwork.com/2012/09/homemade-dishwasher-soap-save-money-right-now.html

http://www.thriftyniftymommy.com/2012/12/homemade-dishwasher-detergent-recipe.html?m=1

http://i-4details.blogspot.com/2012/10/homemade-dishwasher-gel-soap-green.html?m=1

Prior to this I used the liquid cascade and one cascade gel pack per wash. I suppose you could also use the homemade liquid and dry mix in the same manner. Either way both are effective in different ways.