Five Minutes to a Like-New Dishwasher?

My dishwasher hasn't been doing a great job lately. It's not very old, and I don't think the problem is the detergent. The problem is mostly a granular residue (food particles, I suppose) on the inside of glasses.

I came across this article that has a method for cleaning the dishwasher to improve its performance. I was a bit wary of sticking a wire into the sprayer holes! I don't advocate this: use your own judgment.

I inspected the sprayer arms and found that one of the openings was plugged with food; I guess the water pressure at the end of the arm isn't enough to push it out. I carefully removed the piece of food, then ran the rinse-only cycle to flush out any remaining particles.

I've run the dishwasher one or two times since then, and the dishes have been clean. I hope that continues, but I'm glad to have found a solution that works for now.

edited 6/15 to add: I've now run the dishwasher at least ten times since this, and I've had no problems with that gritty residue. And to think that I was about to tell my husband that we should start thinking about a new dishwasher!

For more ideas that work, check out Works for Me Wednesday.