Earlier quoted context omitted.
Overheat your Teflon pan, take a good huff, wait a few hours and post that comment again. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polymer_fume_fever ”When PTFE is heated above 450 °C the pyrolysis products are different and inhalation may cause acute lung injury. Symptoms are flu-like (chills, headaches and fevers) with chest tightness and mild cough. Onset occurs about 4 to 8 hours after exposure to the pyrolysis products of…
Who is really heating teflon pans to 850 F on the stovetop?
Cooking with black plastic is particularly crucial to avoid
731–740 of 886 posts
Re: Cooking with black plastic is particularly crucial to avoid
#732Earlier quoted context omitted.
A hob takes up space my tiny kitchen doesn't have to spare, and besides the limited power available at the wall in the US means it isn't that useful. In the US we almost always use a range not a cooktop. I need one with an oven. Something like https://www.homedepot.com/p/Amana-30-in-4-Burner-Element-Fre... - which is several hundred cheaper than what you linked. As long as I'm going to replace what I have, spending a…
You're linking to literally the lowest end builder grade piece of crap* non flat range, you even picked the one that doesn't have the oven window! I've even had near slumlords at least spring for the windowed glass top GE special when it was on sale. (I say crap, but that is unfair, having used these growing up, they are simple and basically won't break down and exceptionally easy to get parts for and repair [because…
I expect my range to last for a few decades and I cook often. If I'm going to spend several thousand dollars I want something worth it and so far I can't find anything that fixes all the issues with the 40 year old range that came with my house and so I'm saving my money for some other 'toy' I will enjoy. as an engineer I'm in good finiancial shape but not so good I can replace my range whenever I feel like it (if I was I'd have a much larger kitchen)
Re: Cooking with black plastic is particularly crucial to avoid
#733Earlier quoted context omitted.
You don't have to get cast-iron necessarily. Try carbon-steel. My mother doesn't like cast iron because of the maintenance required, and we don't use non-stick for the alleged health issues. Got a bunch of carbon-steel cookware and she loves it.
Carbon steel has the same maintenance requirements as cast iron. I do like it better because of weight though.
Re: Cooking with black plastic is particularly crucial to avoid
#734Earlier quoted context omitted.
Shipping something that weighs only a few pounds and can be shipped along with tens of thousands of shipping containers (i.e., is not needed at the destination in a day or two) costs almost no CO2 emissions.
It costs as much as shipping just one container. Just because you can distribute the emissions over more people doesn’t make it less bad for the environment. Not ordering something from overseas is the only solution.
Re: Cooking with black plastic is particularly crucial to avoid
#735Earlier quoted context omitted.
This you? https://www.reddit.com/r/Cooking/comments/taz86n/comment/i04...
No, that's not me. In any case, in our language we don't use the same word for the pan coating that we use for food flavouring. There is no smell on these pans! But yes, if people are treating their cookware as referenced in that page, then I understand why you are appalled.
Re: Cooking with black plastic is particularly crucial to avoid
#736Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yeah, I get the impression that bagged salads are probably the most dangerous food item.
Well they've got a couple things going for them— they're sealed so there's very little chance of cross-contamination in transit or storage, and since it's a ready-to-eat food item rather than a raw ingredient, at least the more reputable companies probably need a pretty solid HACCP plan (short for Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Points— a formal for safety risk analysis and their mitigation procedures), which me…
I'm in the UK and didn't realise that. We easily buy raw milk cheeses here, but they do carry a warning about people with compromised immune systems and pregnant women.
> There are other things that are risky that people don't realize— cooked room temperature rice, raw flour, room temperature brewed tea
I was aware of the issues with pre-cooked rice and how reheating it is unlikely to make it safe. Raw flour is a new one for me - I would assume that it being dried would kill off most nasties.
However, room temperature brewed tea is incredibly dangerous here in the UK as you're likely to get lynched if you serve that to someone as a nice cuppa. Otherwise, I'd guess that it's the sugar content that gives the bacteria something to munch - it's why kombucha can be dangerous if not brewed carefully though that's more a case of getting the desirable bacteria to out-compete the nasty ones.
Re: Cooking with black plastic is particularly crucial to avoid
#737Earlier quoted context omitted.
Does any of this matter in a normal life? Will I actually see actual difference if I throw away all my cook ware and replace it with non-non-stick ones and wooden utensils? What about pollutants in the air from car and industry exhaust? Is this cookware worse? Should we first consider moving somewhere else than worry about cookware? What about just the ingredients you cook with? Is using teflon worse than buying high…
I never understood this argument. Would you eat a credit card? I mean, why not, you eat a credit cards worth of microplastics a week per this article: https://www.reuters.com/graphics/ENVIRONMENT-PLASTIC/0100B4T... So let me ask you again. Its Friday. You have a rib eye, asparagus, and an old credit card on your plate. I’m sure you would not eat a credit card, and would think people were insane for doing so. So why n…
The argument is that you probably are doing way worse things health wise than using a teflon cookware or black plastic cooking utensils. This is just a scare click bait.
Re: Cooking with black plastic is particularly crucial to avoid
#738Earlier quoted context omitted.
But why take the chance? Just buy a metal spatula next time and there’s nothing to worry about if it turns out to be true
Metal spatulas cause damage to frying pans. How do I know which is worse, the plastic melting off my black spatula or the non-stick coating scraping off my frying pan? I suppose I could go cast iron, but I'm sure I can find a study saying those are terrible too.
some minor outputs of food oil oxidation/polymerization are believed to be probable carcinogens. these compounds will be present in all food cooked on any surface. this varies more significantly based on your food choice and preparation method than your cookware selection. if you're eating, you're consuming oxidized and polymerized food oils.
the pan itself could potentially contribute iron to your food, or molecular variants like rust or magnetite (oxidized iron). this iron isn't harmful. you're more likely to be deficient than have too much iron. in fact, cooking with iron is occasionally advocated as a way to supplement iron nutrition, to treat iron-deficient anemia.
there are potential impurities in the iron alloy of the pan. most impurities are removed by the foundry process as 'slag'. when iron is heated to molten temperature, everything reactive will burn off or evaporate. other metals will float or precipitate. slag is removed before casting, but some may remain mixed - these will be oxides of foundry inputs used to regulate the melt such as calcium, magnesium, aluminum, and barium. these are controlled to low fractions, but even so are nontoxic or nutritious when ingested. if you're using metal cookware, there is some slag in your cookware.
i just now tried to find a study indicating some harmful property of cast iron but i couldn't find one.
just stop using plastic to cook. it's not hard, and it's not expensive. it's even easier than being miserable on the internet
Re: Cooking with black plastic is particularly crucial to avoid
#739Earlier quoted context omitted.
Carbon steel is not nonstick without adding oil. Also you can’t use it with acidic foods. I actually prefer stainless steel most of the time, the sticking is more of a feature for many foods since it promotes browning. (But I do use basically every type of pan for different things)
Oh interesting, that's a point I hadn't considered -- do people really cook in non-stick pans without any sort of oil? I've never owned one so genuinely didn't realize people did that. My Mediterranean family brought me up to use olive oil liberally! And also true re: acidic foods -- I've got a couple stainless, but mainly use my enameled cast iron or clay (tagine) for tomato based dishes.
Definitely!
As much as I generally love it, e.g. pancakes with olive oil sound like a dubious idea, taste-wise.
Regarding frying things in olive oil, I was also under the impression that it's not particularly heat-stable and unhealthy substances can start forming at relatively low temperatures?
Re: Cooking with black plastic is particularly crucial to avoid
#740When I was a kid everyone told me never to burn plastic, because it produces tons of hazardous chemicals.
As far as I know, burning a clear PET water bottle is harmless as it only releases carbon dioxide (and water vapor). PET is the opposite of flame-retardant, BTW. Light the top of a clear PET water bottle and it'll often burn like a candle (though much faster).
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/002689708020778...