221–230 of 412 posts
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I can't do the temperature control thing so I use ceramic cookware for things like eggs mostly.
I bought some of those too, but I can't help but wonder if they have their own untested harmful chemicals
"a coating system based on sol-gel technology, made without PFOA and PTFE"
but I haven't yet found out with any more detail what it actually _is_.
It does not look cool but vapor cooking is a miracle. It is fast, it is clean, it preserves nutriments. People who like to "cook" don't like it because they can't perform their magic rituals. Cooking has always seemed something very religious to me... Cooking some stuff for a long time, adding secret ingredients supposedly to give "extra" taste... Putting stuff on the pan, then turning on the oven jsut to melt a laye…
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I do not trust BPA-free plastics either. I have switched from cans to tetrapaks where possible. My confusion came from some misleading industry documents I read which suggested that PFOA/PFOS/C8 had been replaced with a process that did not require fluorosurfactants. I feel like the information about these chemicals is so confusing, it's hard for a non-chemist like me to understand.
Can you elaborate ? What's wrong with cans ? If they're aren't just aliminum what are they coated with on the inside ? How would tetrapak fare better ?
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I do not trust BPA-free plastics either. I have switched from cans to tetrapaks where possible. My confusion came from some misleading industry documents I read which suggested that PFOA/PFOS/C8 had been replaced with a process that did not require fluorosurfactants. I feel like the information about these chemicals is so confusing, it's hard for a non-chemist like me to understand.
Can you elaborate ? What's wrong with cans ? If they're aren't just aliminum what are they coated with on the inside ? How would tetrapak fare better ?
The study didn’t actually find anything related to cookware. Modern Teflon in the US doesn’t expose people to PFOA/PFOS like old version did due to new regulations. The chemicals could also be entering peoples body’s through drinking water or bioaccumulation in meat or plants. You should throw away nonstick cookware from before 2013, but new nonstick cookware sold in the US does not have PFOA. I believe the EU follow…
I cook eggs on cast iron without them sticking, but it requires maintenance on the seasoning. The trick is to use some butter when cooking with eggs, and they slide right off. A quick wipe with a paper towel and the pan is clean (leaving butter residue helps keep it oiled for next time). Cast iron is a pain to clean if you burn food and the burnt pieces stick, but the investment into learning how to cook with it is w…
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I cook eggs on cast iron without them sticking, but it requires maintenance on the seasoning. The trick is to use some butter when cooking with eggs, and they slide right off. A quick wipe with a paper towel and the pan is clean (leaving butter residue helps keep it oiled for next time). Cast iron is a pain to clean if you burn food and the burnt pieces stick, but the investment into learning how to cook with it is w…
I actually wonder if the charred food contains just as toxic of chemicals? Heating edible oils above 200C and/or for prolonged periods produces transfats, for instance, and there is extremely complex chemistry going on in the burnt portion of foods (or really any substance containing a kind of organic molecule).
Different oils have different smoke points, and heating an oil beyond that smoke point can polymerize the oil and produce free radicals.
Charring foods can create heterocyclic amines, which are associated with cancers.
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One thing I've noticed with stainless steel is that if you have hard water, you get some calcium buildup and things stick like crazy. Anytime my stainless steel pans start having problems I soak a bit of vinegar on them for a bit, scrub them, then they are good again. However my preference is typically cast iron. A good seasoned coating (and a couple decades of use that results in a polished surface) is typically muc…
> if you have hard water, you get some calcium buildup and things stick like crazy. Anyone using stainless cookware should be using Bar Keepers Friend, it's like magic on stainless steel. The oxalic acid in it removes calcium buildup and helps passivate the stainless steel, the surfactant in it somehow dissolves browned oil stains (even the nasty burned in ones on the bottom of the pot) and the feldspar dust in it pr…
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Not really. And I say this as someone who owns and frequently cooks with stainless steel, cast iron, and non-stick, I have for decades and also worked in a professional kitchen at one point. Some things are always better in stainless or cast iron... I tend towards meats in cast iron and veggies in stainless, though it really depends. Other things are easiest in nonstick, but can be learned in stainless, like eggs sun…
You can get a nice carbon steel or cast iron pan nonstick enough to do things like classical omelets through seasoning alone. (Though the shape of cast iron generally makes it impractical in that particular example.) All the French old timers did. But they need to only be used for that and most home cooks aren't willing to have a pan they only use for one thing. Also, most home cooks-- even the ones that really think…
I have a cheap 10" Lodge skillet that we use for everything. It pretty much lives on the stovetop. We make omelets every morning, wash it off, and put back on the stove to dry. Quesadillas at lunch. Red sauce for dinner. Potato gratin. Pineapple upside-down cake. You name it, it goes in the skillet, often without any oil.
The only time I ever have trouble with stuff sticking is after several days in a row of tomatoes or similar. Acidic stuff like that does damage the seasoning, and if you let it sit it will stick. Other than that, stuff comes right off even after hours of sitting around.
So many people seem to think you have to baby these skillets, and that's just not been my experience at all. It's not as nonstick as a brand-new teflon pan, but it's better than that same pan will be after 6 months, and if I damage the seasoning on my cast iron it really does repair itself through normal cooking (with a bit of extra oil in the meantime).