Quiet and Clean Dishes = happy mommy

One Saturday afternoon my husband went to turn on our very packed dishwasher only to find nothing happen.  After checking a few things, we decided that our ancient dishwasher had finally washed it's last load and died a peaceful death.  I was grateful that it had not stopped working during a rinse cycle!  We have lived in our home for over seven years and this was the last appliance to be replaced.  It looked old when we moved in, so I have no idea it's actual age.  We have a one year old who has greatly increased our use of our dishwasher, so I decided that afternoon to pack us up in the car and head over to our local family owned appliance store to purchase a new one.  I had no idea what I wanted, except for a dishwasher that was reliable and quiet.

The store we shop at for our appliances tends to feature only high end appliances in the showroom, but they can order almost anything one could want.  Since we didn't have anything in mind, we trusted the sales woman, who I've dealt with in the past, to make some recommendations.  Having a stainless steel interior became a priority, as it does not stain or hold odors.  It also insulates the machine adding to quieting the motor.  Our previous machine was plastic lined and extremely stained despite all our efforts to clean it.  We got our choices down to a Bosch or a Kitchen Aid.  We chose the Kitchen Aid because it had a food disposal built in, where as the Bosch had a filter that needed to be removed and cleaned periodically.  An added incentive to choosing this model, the KUDK031T, was a $50 rebate. 

The Kitchen Aid Architect II K Series Dishwasher is a built-in dishwasher that is available in four colors: white, black, biscuit, and stainless steel.  It features a built-in front door handle and a flat button control panel near the top of the pull-down door.  It features four wash cycles:  heavy duty, normal wash, light/china, and rinse only.  It also features four options: sani-rinse, hi-temp scrub, heat dry, and a 4-hour delay.  There is also a button lock to prevent accidentally turning the machine on (which is what my one year old will do once he discovers he is tall enough to reach the buttons.)  The other two panel buttons are  start/resume and cancel.  When in use, the buttons illuminate a lovely shade of LED blue.  There are three spray arms in the unit:  one in the bottom, one in the middle under the top rack, and one in the top of the unit above the top rack.  There are two dish racks.  The bottom one has a utensil basket that fits into the side of the rack and features a center section that includes a movable lid to keep small items trapped.  There are flexi-fold down (tm) flexible tines in the bottom rack to accommodate larger items, such a pots or baking dishes and in the top rack to increase space for larger bowls.  The top rack also features light-item clips on a few of the tines for plastic cups or other light objects.  I've found them perfect for holding my son's sippy cups and bottles in place.  These clips are removable and can be rearranged in the rack as needed.  In the door is a detergent compartment with section for pre-wash detergent, as well as a main compartment.  This machine only uses automatic dishwasher detergent.  There is also a compartment for rinse aid and a dial for adjusting the rinse aid based upon the type of water one has (hard vs. soft.)  As mentioned earlier, there is also food disposal in the floor of the unit, which means dishes do not need to be pre-rinsed. 

Using the dishwasher is easy.  Load the dishes and glasses, or pots and pans so that they do not overlap.  Add detergent and rinse aid if needed (there is a gauge that indicates when more rinse aid is needed,) push the door shut to hear the click of the lock.  Run the water in your sink until it is hot, then turn it off.  Then turn on the cycle desired and hit start.  Then wait.  A while.  A normal cycle with pre-rinsed dishes and the heat dry option takes one hour 41 minutes.  Add the sani rinse or do not pre-rinse the dishes and it can take up to three and a half hours!  If preferred, the four hour delay option does exactly what it says, however, I haven't discovered a need for that option yet. 

Cool features: if you have started your dishwasher and discover a stray dish or glass that you forgot to load, you can open the door slowly and add the item if it is before the main wash cycle has started, pushing resume to continue the wash.  Sani Rinse is to sanitize your dishes and glasses in accordance with NSF/ANSI Standard 184 for residential dishwashers.  I think this option would be helpful when illness is rampant in the house to assure that the flu bug isn't passed around.  (Other than that, I'm not sure that I'd use it.)  The light/china cycle is perfect for those rare occasions I use my wedding china and really don't want to hand wash all that Lenox.  The hi-temp scrub is for tough, baked on foods, such as baking dishes or pots and pans.  The heat dry option is automatic for all cycles except the rinse only and can be turned off to conserve energy or if light plastic is being washed and could potentially melt. 

My experience so far has been very positive.  Our dishes come out clean every time and the glasses look spotless.  I do pre-rinse my dishes/glasses/utensils before loading them simply because I do not run the dishwasher daily and things sit for a day or two sometimes.  While I am still getting used to loading the racks, I find that I really like the design of the utensil compartment and the top rack.  When running, I can only hear the motor if I am in the kitchen.  I love this, since our last dishwasher could be heard throughout the house, it was that loud.  The added wash cycles may be unnecessary, but I like having options. 

There are two things so far that I do not like about this machine.  The first is the bottom rack.  I find it hard to arrange my dishes to maximize the space.  I have Pfaltzgraff stoneware dishes that are large.  I haven't had a problem fitting them in, but there are three rows for dishes and my dinner plates are a bit too large to load anything in the row next to them.  The second problem is that the bottom rack rolls out very easily and doesn't have a mechanism to catch it.  While for most people this would not be an issue at all, however my one year old likes to pull the rack out quickly and tends to do it when it has dishes loaded.  It is quite comical watching the adults load the dishwasher as fast as possible before the one year old has the time to toddle across the room and play with the rack.  (It also helps to keep him strapped into his high chair while loading the dishes too!)   

While the length of the wash and dry cycle is long, this doesn't bother me as we tend to turn the unit on before bed.  I usually wash my pots and pans by hand, but out of curiosity, I did load some pyrex baking dishes into the machine to test it out.  They came out perfectly clean.  The plastic cups and bottles have also come out spotless and we haven't had any melting issues while using the normal heat dry option.  I even was able to fit my son's high chair tray into the bottom rack and it came out great. 

We did have this dishwasher installed by a professional contractor, as our house is old and we are not mechanically inclined to figure out how to install things that involve electricity and water. 

All in all, I am extremely happy with this Kitchen Aid dishwasher.  I have used other Kitchen Aid appliances and am once again impressed with a high quality product from this reputable company.