I wash dishes without soap. I just use lightly used paper towels (my husband uses them), cut-up clothes, plastic bags, or crumpled magazines, etc. to wipe off the excess food into the trash and when those are thoroughly dirty, I throw them out. Then I clean the dishes thoroughly (with a sponge with scratch pad on one side) usually under a slow running faucet with dishes underneath (that need soaking) collecting the water and put in a dish rack to dry. I also sometimes use salt as an abrasive for scrubbing or soak something in salt water for sanitizing. I use cold water. It helps if you don't use plastic containers. I learned in childcare classes years ago that the action that does most all of the germ removal during the washing of hands is the friction action of scrubbing, also I allow dishes to dry thoroughly on the rack before putting them away. Germs can't grow where there's no water.
