Product Review: How do you test dishwasher detergent?

Do you have a favorite dishwasher detergent? One that cuts through everything you can throw at your dishes? Or do you just pick up whatever is on sale.

I used to pick mine by which one dissolved best in my dishwasher (the powder tabs did not work well), and left the dishes clean, which left me with lots of options to choose from. Usually I would pick the one that was on sale and that I could easily find a coupon for.

That, however, was before the dishwasher from ****.

That's right, I don't like my dishwasher. I had a beautiful, white, wonderfully efficient dishwasher, but traded it for my bigger kitchen. My new kitchen came with a dishwasher, but one that left most of my dishes dirty and had me rewashing everything.

When you go through as many dishes as I do, that's really not fun.

So when I was offered the chance to try out some Cascade All-in-1 ActionPacs, dishwasher detergent, I thought, "Why not? I can't possibly make my dishes any dirtier."

I didn't really notice a difference at first. That could have been the dishwasher. So just to be sure, and because I had to, I scrubbed out the inside of my dishwasher, I ran it through several cycles with a special dishwasher cleaner, I sprayed it down with CLR and ran it again. Then I went back and tested what I had been using against the Cascade.

If you happen to have a dishwasher that isn't cousin to mine, the All-in-1 ActionPacs are a good choice for getting your dishes clean. The Cascade worked a bit better than what I had been using, but I was still indifferent about what I would buy the next time I was shopping.


Then I bought myself a package of the Cascade ActionPacs with Extra Bleach. Which, coincidentally enough, was on sale, and had a coupon.

And is now my regular dishwasher detergent.

So I guess I've answered my own question: you test dishwasher detergent by making alot of dirty dishes, then letting the detergent get them clean. And you pick one by how well it cleans your dishes.

Think I can find a detergent that will unload the dishwasher for me now?