Ask HN: Why do people stack plates? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Why do people stack plates?

12 pointspharmakom19 comments

After a meal, people conventionally stack plates. This makes no sense to me. By stacking the plates, food gets on the bottom of each plate (except the first one) which before was mostly clean. Now there is more surface area to clean. For context this is washing up by hand, no dish washer. If I ask people not to stack plates, they look at me like an alien!

Why do people stack plates?

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As someone who has organized and done the dishwashing for gathering of 50+ people in very basic settings (outdoors, using plastic tubs and communal washing facilities) I can tell you that the grease under the plates are largely irrelevant. It makes no difference whether the grease is stuck to the upper or the lower side of a plate. Much more inefficiency is created by people not collecting plates, not sorting them but building arbitrary piles with everything squeezed in between plates, and dropping their plates and cutlery into the wrong pool of water. Because what you want to do is, where possible, make it so that everything goes through several stages, the first being a tub where all you do is wash the grossest stuff off; this can also be the tub where you tell people to drop everything into (except the napkins). Space allowing it is actually advantageous to not drop cups and glasses there as they tend to be much less greasy and yes, that can make a difference. So the challenge is in fact partly to keep surfaces from becoming greasy, but the bottoms of plates are not a a problem. If you pick up the plates from the tables you have to stack them anyway, because it will not be very practical to have 50 plates on a table right next to each other. Just try to treat cups and glasses separately and you'll be good.

Traditionally, to be able to transport them in one trip, since most of the time, one person clears the table while the others remain seated. It's more an act of courtesy towards the person clearing the table, to save them a trip. Also, the stack takes up less room in small kitchens if cleaning the plates is not scheduled directly after the meal. However, your house, your rules...

It may be also be a question of how forcefully you are making your point / standing your ground on this matter. Have you considered that people may be looking at you like an alien because you are very vocal about, in the grand scheme of things, a very minor matter? I could imagine that, since this is bothering you so much that you are posting about it on HN.

I’m hoping for a very nerdy breakdown of the various approaches :)

When transporting plates from A to B, it was found (p<0.001) that plates stacked along the axis of maximal moment of inertia had a lower transport time than either plates stacked along either of the minor axes or to individual transport.

Obviously this phenomenon deserves further study: although use of one-way dishware [Moore10] is unlikely to prove informative; we suggest investigation of non-homogenous stacking regimes, at the very least comparison with boustrophedonic stacking [Bunyan16] but perhaps even extending to aperiodic stackings [Gardner77].

I don't understand the downvote for this. It was a great addition to this thread.

It seems to be a nonsensical answer produced by an AI?

Moore10: https://www.dixie.com/our-story (one-way should be "disposable")

Bunyan16: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Bunyan (Babe)

Gardner77: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/mathematical-game... (paywall sux)

also, cf https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ellipsoid#Dynamical_properties (I might have flipped maximal and minimal moments. Would an AI have?)

It was a response to 'nerdy breakdown of the various approaches' and it fits the bill.

At least in my social circles, the standard for cleaning plates is that both sides need to be washed anyway. Spare countertop space in kitchens (to spread out un-stacked plates) is not all that plentiful. A dishwasher machine may work a bit better if some food is moved from the top of the plates to the bottoms.

And if they'll be left to sit for a good while before washing (say, I plan to wash dishes after dessert & socializing & then people leave) any food that is trapped between stacked plates does not dry onto either surface of the plate.

You're washing the bottom of your plates too, right? Might as well make the carrying easier

> Now there is more surface area to clean.

I can't imagine thinking that way when it comes to basic food hygiene.

If it came out of the drawer/cupboard it gets washed (by hand) all over no matter whether it was used, looks clean, fell on the floor, only has one side soiled ... All over, all the time, just as basic hygiene.

Also in our house we rinse off the (probably unhealthy) detergent before stacking to drip dry, prior to using a drying towel. I'm not at all sure what anionic surfactants are, but they don't sound like ambrosia to me.

My dish detergent of choice is antibacterial too so cloths, sponges, bowls and sink should be quite sanitary. Also using the dish cloth to wipe down prep surfaces after a meal adds some antibacterial hygiene to the kitchen.

> My dish detergent of choice is antibacterial too so cloths, sponges, bowls and sink should be quite sanitary. Also using the dish cloth to wipe down prep surfaces after a meal adds some antibacterial hygiene to the kitchen.

relevant studies seem to hint that antibacterial detergents in households is associated with more (resistant?) bacteria around the sink

I can well believe it.

I'm happy to personally live by the 5 second (or 10 depending on the item) rule but wouldn't want to serve food to someone that wasn't clean.

I don't pay much attention to washing the underside of such plates, and the washed plates don't seem to retain any noticeable dirt on the underside either. So I'm inclined to think there's not much of an actual problem.

Maybe if the household has that culture of not eating half of their portion, then there's a lot more excess food in play.

Easier to move multiple plates. Plate getting washed anyway, so who gives a fuck about the bottom. Source: busboy for ~3 months

When I have access to a dishwasher appliance I just don't care.

If I don't I might not stack the plates depending on the distance to the kitchen and the number of plates in total. Not stacking plates is like programming without an array / list. It can work better when you only have a few items to calculate.

The simplest way is to cook with a cast iron skillet and directly eat out of the skillet then there is no plate to clean. And you don't even need detergent to clean the cast iron skillet. Just hot water with a brush is good enough.

I don’t stack plates at dinner parties, I clear each guests plate separately. In the kitchen I discretely clear the plate into the garbage then stack the plates in the sink, adding some water, then tending to the next course.

It is a social signal that you are thankful for the meal and appearing to want to reduce work for the host.

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