Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Cooking with black plastic is particularly crucial to avoid

theatlantic.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

401–410 of 886 posts

Re: Cooking with black plastic is particularly crucial to avoid

#401

Post by alwayslikethis »

ndsipa_pomu wrote: post #358
hanniabu wrote: post #353

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> don't overheat it Good luck with that. Temperature isn't perfect and hot pockets of higher temperatures form.

The problem temperature is 260°C which can easily be avoided by not heating an empty pan (oil/liquids will distribute the heat more evenly) and you'd be unlikely to want to cook at that kind of temperature.

Teflon is not very thermally conductive, so the bottom contacting the metal substrate may be at a significantly higher temperature than the top. Chemistry reactions have activation energies, and you can generally always trade temperature for time. If it happens in a minute at 260 C, it will still happen at 200 C, just slower.

Re: Cooking with black plastic is particularly crucial to avoid

#402

Post by frmersdog »

potato3732842 wrote: post #363
andruby wrote: post #299

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is $59 for a single hub, or $849 for a full cooktop really that much of an "expensive luxury"? These things last for decades and cost less than most mobile phones. https://www.ikea.com/us/en/cat/induction-cooktops-20813/

The difference between electricity cost per btu and gas cost per btu is the sticking point for the bulk of consumers.

No one ever figures in the cost of medical care from breathing low-grade gas fumes for years. Or the occasional spontaneous house explosion.

Re: Cooking with black plastic is particularly crucial to avoid

#403

Post by crispyambulance »

lukevp wrote: post #348
xmodem wrote: post #317

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wood is not dishwasher safe, metal will damage the cookware's non-stick coating, which may be worse than the plastic I'm trying to avoid. I guess that leaves silicone.

Use a carbon steel or cast iron pan and learn how to season properly. They are very nonstick if you cook correctly in them, and their surface is incredibly durable (I use metal spatulas and I primarily cook on carbon steel and a cast iron griddle.) you can also incorporate stainless steel pots, although stainless pans are not nonstick and very hard to use for beginners.

A properly seasoned cast iron pan can be non-stick but the temperature has to be right, you need shortening, and you can't just put any amount of food in it at any temperature.

Stainless is can do the job too, but temperature and shortening is even more important. There's a much tighter window of temperature that it works at. You do the "water drop test" to determine that it's ready. See youtube for an infinity of videos on how to check the stainless is at right temperature!

I've given up on non-stick pans. They're semi-disposable because the don't last very long and you don't want to use them at high temperatures. All it takes is a little bit of skill to never have to use non-stick teflon pans.

Re: Cooking with black plastic is particularly crucial to avoid

#404

Post by lazylizard »

ndsipa_pomu wrote: post #344
lazylizard wrote: post #339

im lost. whats a plastic? silicone is not plastic? why specifically black plastic? which black pigment? all black plastics use the same pigment?which plastic? is black silicone ok? how about rubber? other colors with same flame retardant is ok? or somehow only black (all plastics?) use 1 particular flame retardant? its strangely specific yet strangely vague?

Silicone is a rubber, not a plastic and black silicone should be fine.

so black silicones and rubber don't use the same pigment or flame retardant? or they don't leach out?

Re: Cooking with black plastic is particularly crucial to avoid

#405

Post by soylentcola »

_yb2s wrote: post #391
IG_Semmelweiss wrote: post #374

Earlier quoted context omitted.

question since you obviously know the topic! a cast iron or "stainless" steel pan will get some gruff from cooking since its nonstick. It regularly goes to the dishwasher, some stuff won't get cleaned. Mostly oil burn stains it seems ("stainless" hardly!) . Is that completely safe/expected ? We obviously diddn't get that with the nonstick pans. We got rid of that stuff for a reason, now i'm not sure what is worse: no…

Cast iron is intentionally seasoned with oxidized cooking oil to make it non stick, and that should not be cleaned off. Stainless is pretty easy to get totally clean with steel wool and/or scotchbrite pad sponges.

And Barkeeper's Friend makes it easy to polish up stainless if you like it to look fresh. I find it's mostly cosmetic, but I still do it a few times a year.

Re: Cooking with black plastic is particularly crucial to avoid

#406

Post by ndsipa_pomu »

__MatrixMan__ wrote: post #398
ndsipa_pomu wrote: post #362

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No - silicone isn't a plastic and is much better for food preparation.

Ok, but why? It's a synthetic molded polymer, so I think it fits all the definitions that I can find. Are we saying that plastics are bad and then redefining "plastic" as the subset of the previous classification which are bad? That's the kind of language trickery that duped us into making utensils out of an industrial waste product in the first place. If we're going to protect future generations from whatever harm c…

What we commonly refer to as "plastics" are mainly chains of carbon atoms, whereas silicone is a chain of siloxanes instead.

Silicone is better for food preparation as it withstands heat better, has low toxicity (especially compared to additives used with plastic utensils), low reactivity, high resistance to oxygen, ozone and ultraviolet light, doesn't support microbes and repels water which is great for things like spatulas.

Re: Cooking with black plastic is particularly crucial to avoid

#407

Post by alpaca128 »

sa1 wrote: post #346
stonedge wrote: post #338

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sincere question - my mom always told me to never put wooden utensils in the dishwasher, but I never got a great answer as to why. I put my wooden spatulas in there. My question is, is it just because it's destructive to the wood? Or is there something else that I should be concerned about?

The wood dries out and cracks.

Within the last 20+ years one of about 5 wooden spoons in our household has cracked even though they're always cleaned in the dishwasher. I don't see the problem.

Re: Cooking with black plastic is particularly crucial to avoid

#408

Post by crazygringo »

I really wish OXO would put out a statement here.

A lot of people use it's black plastic tools like this one [1] -- like a lot of brands, OXO calls its black plastic tools "nylon" to differentiate from "silicone" -- and it would be really, really good to know if OXO has always rigorously made sure never to use recycled plastics, or if testing shows that its own products contain flame retardants.

In other words, when you pay premium prices for stuff like OXO as opposed to a dollar-store black plastic spatula, are you getting premium quality that avoids the kind of contamination described in the article? Or are the premium prices just going to the design and marketing, but not to the manufacturing?

[1] https://www.oxo.com/shop/kitchenware/utensils/sets-holders-a...

Re: Cooking with black plastic is particularly crucial to avoid

#409

Post by _yb2s »

whoitwas wrote: post #292

After I learned about the harmful effects of Teflon, I became much more cautious about consumption. It's nearly impossible to avoid the toxins when eating out because wax has been replaced with synthetics that leach into food from packaging. Just use metal wood or glass. One thing I'm not aware of is if Pyrex or the other tempered glasses are safe or if they also contain plastic. That would be good to learn.

A lot of vintage glass things including Pyrex contain high levels of lead. I need to look into it more, but it seems to be from paint or colors added, and clear glass items are likely fine.

Re: Cooking with black plastic is particularly crucial to avoid

#410

Post by crispyambulance »

IG_Semmelweiss wrote: post #374
lukevp wrote: post #348

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Use a carbon steel or cast iron pan and learn how to season properly. They are very nonstick if you cook correctly in them, and their surface is incredibly durable (I use metal spatulas and I primarily cook on carbon steel and a cast iron griddle.) you can also incorporate stainless steel pots, although stainless pans are not nonstick and very hard to use for beginners.

question since you obviously know the topic! a cast iron or "stainless" steel pan will get some gruff from cooking since its nonstick. It regularly goes to the dishwasher, some stuff won't get cleaned. Mostly oil burn stains it seems ("stainless" hardly!) . Is that completely safe/expected ? We obviously diddn't get that with the nonstick pans. We got rid of that stuff for a reason, now i'm not sure what is worse: no…

Stainless, when used properly, won't have hard-stuck burnt oil on it. They clean up nicely by just boiling some water in it and then a light scrub-- no need for dishwasher.

Worst case-- you've gone too high in temperature for too long and you need some bon-ami.

Post reply on HN