How to Make Your Own Homemade Dishwashing Detergent?

Homemade dishwasher detergent is an alternative to industrial detergents. It’s made from simple, natural, and biodegradable ingredients and comes in various forms: powder, liquid, tablets, or gel. What’s the benefit? To effectively clean dishes while protecting your health and the environment, for a minimalist home cleaning routine.

Saying goodbye to store-bought dishwasher detergents and opting for a homemade solution offers several benefits:

• Reduced use of chemicals harmful to health and the environment: Homemade recipes avoid irritants, allergens, or pollutants often found in commercial formulas.

• Savings on the purchase of commercial products: Basic ingredients like baking soda, citric acid, or washing soda are inexpensive and last a long time.

• Knowledge of the ingredients in dishwashing products: By making your own product, you know exactly what you’re putting on your dishes and what you’re releasing into wastewater.

• Elimination of residue on dishes: A homemade product used in the right amount rinses off more easily and leaves fewer chemical traces on plates, glasses, and cutlery.

• Reducing plastic packaging: By reusing containers or buying in bulk, you limit the number of containers and contribute to a zero-waste approach.

Most recipes use white vinegar, baking soda, or washing soda. Let’s take a closer look at these natural products and their benefits.

The Benefits of White Vinegar for the Dishwasher

White vinegar acts as a limescale remover and a powerful deodoriser. It helps prevent limescale buildup and improves washing performance, as well as extending the dishwasher’s lifespan. Plus, if your dishwasher is dirty and smells bad, using white vinegar helps get rid of those odors. In fact, it has antibacterial properties that limit the growth of bacteria inside appliances and a very powerful deodorising effect.

The Benefits of Baking Soda for the Dishwasher

Baking soda is a basic ingredient. It cleans, degreases, deodorises, and softens hard water. This means it limits limescale buildup on the walls and seals of your dishwasher. In addition, baking soda also inhibits bacterial growth. It thus helps preserve your appliance while effectively cleaning your dishes.

The Benefits of Soda Crystals for the Dishwasher

Soda crystals are even more alkaline than baking soda. They are excellent natural degreasers and disinfectants. They help remove food residue and combat limescale and bacteria. Thus, a dishwasher detergent made with soda crystals effectively cleans your dishes, as well as the dishwasher itself. It protects the machine from the effects of limescale and increases its efficiency and lifespan.

Warning: Soda crystals can be irritating! Handle them with care, and wear gloves and goggles when using them. Also, remember to cover your nose and mouth with a scarf or mask.

Spotlight on Ecodétergent 12° Alcohol Vinegar

12% Alcohol Vinegar Eco-Detergent: Highly concentrated, this natural white vinegar with 12% acidity is ideal for all household uses. It is highly effective for cleaning, descaling, and making windows, faucets, showers, sinks, washbasins, and toilet bowls shine, as well as for deep-cleaning and descaling your household appliances (coffee makers, washing machines, etc.)… 100% plant-based, it’s an essential for natural household cleaning! It can be used as a rinse aid.

Focus on Baking Soda: An Eco-Friendly Detergent

Baking Soda: An Eco-Friendly Cleaner: An essential for budget-friendly cleaning, baking soda cleans, degreases, and makes all types of surfaces shine. As a deodoriser, it’s also effective against unpleasant odours.

Focus on Ecodétergent Soda Crystals

Soda crystals as an eco-friendly detergent: A powerful degreaser and multi-purpose cleaner, sodium carbonate—also known as soda crystals—is essential for making your own natural and economical household cleaning products. Highly effective, soda crystals can be used daily to make your own laundry detergent, degrease and scrub dishes, maintain drains, and clean the oven, stovetop, sink, and bathroom.

Choose your basic ingredients: Select natural and effective ingredients, such as mineral powders, mild cleaning agents, and possibly essential oils to scent your mixture.

Adapt the formula to your water: Take into account the hardness of your water (more or less hard) to adjust the proportions and optimize the results on your dishes.

Measure accurately: Maintain a good balance between cleaning agents, disinfectants, and limescale removers to ensure optimal effectiveness without damaging your dishwasher.

Mix in a suitable container: Use a jar or an airtight container to store your mixture, away from moisture and light.

Test your product on a short cycle: Before regular use, run an initial test to check the results: clean dishes, no streaks or residue.

Adjust if necessary: If you notice deposits, streaks, or a scent that is too strong, slightly adjust the quantities or ingredients as needed.

Label and store: Be sure to label your mixture with the date of preparation and the ingredients used, to ensure safe use.

1. Daily cleaning: Fill the rinse aid compartment with white vinegar before each cycle.

2. Weekly maintenance: Sprinkle baking soda on the bottom of the dishwasher before running an empty cycle. If you use your dishwasher less than 3 times a week, this maintenance can be done once every two to three weeks.

3. Monthly descaling: Run an empty cycle after adding 20 grams (50 grams for a large dishwasher) of soda crystals to the bottom of the dishwasher. For subsequent cycles, adjust the amount based on any remaining deposits at the end of the cycle.

Some natural ingredients, although non-toxic, can leave residue in the dishwasher if not measured correctly or rinsed thoroughly. It is therefore important to always test your homemade product on a short cycle and to follow the recommended quantities carefully.

A homemade dishwasher detergent can be just as effective as a commercial product, provided you understand the role of each ingredient. Feel free to adjust your formula based on your water hardness and how dirty your dishes are.

Formerly a manager at an organic shop, Alice spent several years helping her customers choose healthy products that respect both their health and the natural world. Having suffered from endometriosis since her teenage years, she chose to prioritise natural solutions to ease her symptoms and improve her day-to-day well-being. Drawing on her knowledge of naturopathy, she has always explored the benefits of plants and nutrition. Passionate about ecology and deeply connected to nature, Alice makes her own cosmetics and household products to reduce her impact on the planet and all its inhabitants.