The Great Kitchen Debate: Is Cleaning the stove top part of doing the dishes?

Recently in my household there has been some turmoil caused in our kitchen. People are hungry, a hearty meal is made, veges prepped, things fried, a mountain of dishes created. The meal is had and enjoyed, not a problem. The first piece of contention is reached who does the dishes? After that battle has been had a new, slightly more obtuse argument takes centre stage, does the person doing the dishes also clean the stove top?

Now this might seem like a silly thing to write about, but I’ll be damned if it isn’t a serious issue to me! (never in my wildest dreams did I think I’d be writing about this in my youth).

In my personal view the job of dishes should always fall on the person who didn’t do the cooking. This is contentious to everyone else who takes part in the meal as the workload could be as simple as a single pan and as complex as every kitchen appliance you own. The tricky thing here is cleaning the stove top, does that fall under the I cooked you do dishes bylaw? or should the cook take responsibility for the grease splattered mess they have left in their wake? It is an argument I can feel slowly simmering away in my kitchen.

In the past I have lived with all kinds of dish people, ones that hoard all the dishes in their room till you can’t find a fork or mug, ones that turn the kitchen into a battleground then promise they’ll sort it in the morning, the kind that passively aggressively wash a single plate and leave everything else. I’ve seen it all, so don’t get me wrong, I’m grateful that now I have the reliability of clean dishes but I need this burning question answered!

What do you think? Should the person who cooks be responsible for cleaning up the space? Or is that on the person/people who enjoyed the hard made meal they didn’t help prepare? I’d love to know what everyone thinks.

Till then keep your kitchen clean and your sinks dish free, see you next time!