Page 31 - HFHB - Magazine

Lemon dish washing

tablets

Ingredients
1 Cup Washing Soda
1 Cup Bicarbonate of Soda (Baking Soda)
1 Cup Salt
3/4 Cup Lemon Juice.
2 Ice Cube Trays (or similar)

Method
1. Mix all your dry ingredients then pour in lemon juice (make sure you
use a fairly large bowl because it fizzes quite a lot for a few moments).
2. Mix it really well and divide mix between the ice cube trays packing
down really firmly.
3. Leave to dry at least a few hours before popping them out and
leaving overnight to dry completely.
4. Keep in an airtight container and use like any commercial dishwasher
tablet.

Hints and Tips
This recipe made 32 tablets. I used two 16 hole plastic ice cube trays.
They came out quite easily, just gently tap them when you turn them
upside down. Best to check the size of your dispenser before you make
these using an ice cube from the same tray you are going to mould into.

Now for the honest truth. First run of using these tablets epic fail!!!! Here
I am spouting about the goodness of taking care of the earth and I don't
even give you a tried and tested recipe. I found that using my
dishwasher these tablets achieved little cleaning and a lot of residue. I
will persist however I will not give up on my testing. In fact to be totally
honest my dishwasher is crap. Ever since we moved in it is one of the
many things about my home that irritates me it's just terrible. SO given
that the commercial tablets were also a fail a lot of the time I'm not
willing to say this is the recipe. So please give these a try and when you
do I would love to read your comments about the win or fail you have
had. After lots of advice from fellow readers I was to discover my hot
water is just not hot enough in the dish washer. Top Tip: run the hot
water tap in the kitchen sink before starting the load and now I have
sparkly clean dishes!!!
They will harden up a bit more as they dry in a container. However you
may still find they are a bit crumbly, in which case a scoop and into the
dishwasher they go just like dish powder.
If you prefer powder, just omit the lemon juice and instead use 1 Cup of
Citric Acid, mix together and keep in an airtight container. To use place
1 tablespoon per load in the dispenser.
These work out to be around 14c per tablet which is around 3 times
cheaper than leading brands but far less packaging and far more
natural.
For sparkly glassware, pop white vinegar in the rinse aide dispenser.
Such a simple ingredient and so useful in so many areas of household
cleaning.

Article submitted by Mel from Life is For Living