How to Clean Dishes on a Camping Trip

What do you do with your dirty plates and cooking gear while you're camping? You can't just stow them and re-use them. Disposable stuff doesn't work, because you have to haul bags of garbage everywhere with you. Fortunately, there are several ways to get clean and pristine dishes while camping, and you're about to learn them.

Steps

With Soap

Smear a light film of biodegradable soap on the outside of your pots before cooking. This will help keep the pots from charring and make clean up easier.
Boil cleaning water while you're cooking if you have an open burner, or on the fire while you eat. It's a lot easier to clean cookware right after cooking; otherwise the food cools and hardens on the inside of the pots.
Set out three pots or buckets:
- Wash pot: contains hot water with a few drops of biodegradable soap.
- Hot-rinse pot: clear, hot water.
- Cold-rinse pot: cold water with a tiny splash of bleach or similar substance to kill bacteria (see Tips below)
Scrape plates and pans before washing. Wipe them clean to get most of the food particles off of them. This will keep your wash water from getting too dirty, too fast.
Scrub the dishes in the wash pot. If you do this right after you cook, it should require minimal scrubbing (unless you completely burned the pot while cooking).
Dip the dishes in the hot-rinse pot, holding them with tongs. This is important because it gets all of the soap off of the dishes so that they are safe to eat off of later.
Immerse the dishes in the cold rinse for twenty (20) seconds.
Place the dishes on a clean ground cloth or on a piece of tin foil to drip dry. Let them air dry if you have time; otherwise a paper towel will work. To air dry, place the dishes in a clean, dry, mesh drawstring bag, and hang the drawstring on a tree branch or other handy fixture such that the bag with dishes inside doesn't touch anything. Air and sunshine will dry everything quickly without touching any surface that may not be clean. The bleach will evaporate.
Dispose of the dirty dish water by first running a strainer through it thoroughly to remove all of the food particles.
Carry the water 200 feet (60 m) away from your campsite and any water sources, and fling it out in a widespread area, or pour it in the fire pit if you have one.
Take the strainer and empty it into a bag that you will pack and carry out with you.
Pour your rinse water into the empty wash tub to rinse out any soap residue. Pour this water out over the same spot you dumped your wash water.
To sanitize your tubs, pour the cool bleach water into the rinse tub, and then into the wash tub. Lastly, pour that water out over the same spot as the previous two dumps.

Without Soap

Find sand or gravel (that from a stream or river bed is the least likely to have organic matter in it).
Heat water as described above.
Smear a small amount of any leftover cooking grease on the dishes, add wood ashes from the campfire, and mix in a few teaspoons of hot water until a thick cleaning solution results. This soapy mixture is harsh--see Warnings below.
Use a handful of sand or gravel as an abrasive to scrub the dishes clean, using a separate wash pot and rinse pot.
Drip or air dry.
Heat the dishes immediately before cooking with them again to help with sterilization.

Soapless Method 2

Before you build a campfire, clean out the firepit. Do not burn trash in the firepit. Hardwood ashes are best for doing dishes. When you are done cooking, allow the fire to burn down to a manageable level.
Select a good sized metal pot; if you have one that is crusty or greasy from cooking, that is the one to use.
Use a long handled serving spoon to put hot coals and ashes into the pot. About 2 cups will do for most messes.
Add just enough water to make a thin, chunky paste that is hot to the touch but not scalding, and mix it with the ashes.
Smear the hot ash paste liberally over all dirty dishes and utensils. It will look awful, but it works. Use the charcoal to scrub any crusted-on food. For stubborn crust, let the ash paste soak in for a few minutes.
Collect ample water from your source, and carry it and the dirty dishes at least 200 feet away from your water source. Nest the dishes and utensils as much as possible, and rinse them one at a time over the pile to save water. Set each rinsed piece aside in a clean, dry spot until you are done. Make sure to rinse your hands.

Spray and Wash

Use non-stick pans, preferably Analon, and non stick grills, and dedicate a cheap set of cooking gear for camping--one which you don't mind getting charred on the outside. When cooking pans are still hot immediately after cooking, quickly wipe them out with a paper towel, using tongs to avoid burning your hands. Repeat with additional towels if needed until almost no residue is left.
Spray some window cleaner or other spray cleaner--just a little will do--on the pans and let it sit on them as you eat. When you're finished eating, spray some cleaner on the rest of your dishes.
Wipe the dishes soaked in the spray with paper towels so there is very little residue left on them.
Rinse with clean water.
Understand why this works. Less water gets contaminated and dumped at the campsites or in nearby waterways. The food in the wash water does not rot at the campsite attracting ants colonies and/ or rodents. The food gets wiped up and disposed in the garbage, or burned, not dumped on the ground or in rivers. If you want to have almost zero impact, spray with cleaner and wipe with rags and wash the rags at home, leaving almost no residue at the campsite or in the waterways.

Alternate Method: Lick the insides of your personal dishes before the food is hardened. Pouring water in to help scrape the particles and then gulping the water is also a good choice. The second option should be used on pots and pans as well. This is called the big gulp. These methods promote leave no trace camping and are to be used by the hardcore camping type.

Tips

The hotter the water the better. It allows the dishes be cleaned more efficiently, promoting sterilization.
1 capful of bleach will sterilize 5 gallons (20 L) of water - you don't need more than a tiny bit for one or two gallons (4 - 8 L). (One-fifth of a capful is less than a tablespoon.) Ten drops of bleach is a good ratio for a 2 gallon bucket. It also helps minimize your packing, as you only need a tiny dropper bottle to clean up after several meals.
Some people prefer to skip the bleach. If your water is hot enough and soap is used, your dishes should be clean for the next time.
Consider the order you wash in: cups/dishes first, pots last. Pots will be the dirtiest and also will be heated next time you cook, killing any potential bacteria.
Don't have enough containers or buckets to hold the wash or rinse water? A trashbag or two, inside a sturdy box, will do in a pinch.
Teflon pans only require wiping with a paper towel and some sterilization.
Always wash your hands before handling dishes to limit the spread of bacteria.
If you don't have any soap and can't find any gravel or sand to use as an abrasive scrub, mud will work as a cleaner to remove food crusts from you dishes. Just make sure that you wash everything in boiling water.
Pine straw or leaf litter wadded up also makes a good scrub brush to scour out stuck on food from a pot.
For super-easy clean-up and much lighter dishes (important for pack-camping in wilderness areas), try folding plastic camping dishes. When you are done using them and unfold them, they lay flat so are very easy to rinse and wipe clean.

Warnings

The alkali water created by mixing wood ashes with grease can be very harsh on your hands. In extreme cases, it can cause chemical burns just like an acid. Use gloves if you've got them, or a stick to do the scrubbing, and rinse your hands thoroughly when you're done.
Food attracts bears and other animals. Never leave any food items, snacks, candy, leftovers, scraps, in close proximity to your tents and campsite.
Using bleach and other detergents can have a detrimental effect on the environment. They are not allowed in delicate wilderness areas like the Boundary Waters Canoe Area.
Don't use stagnant water, as it's more likely to contain harmful parasites.
Please don't rinse your soapy dishes in the nearby river or lake, even if your detergent says "biodegradable", this is harmful to water life.

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