44 new of 59 responses total.
Re: various Currently, i don't do sauces much. But i'm pretty open to "make something in 5 minutes from the gunk you'd have to clean out of the roast pan anyway" ideas. The number of folks talking about stainless steel sauciers working well with wisks (s^3w^4:) makes me doubtful about a non-stick saucier holding up. My cast iron works pans work for most things, but they do have the sharp side-meets-bottom angle; the rounded saucier would be better for some things. (But i'm now wondering if better than a non-stick rounded fry pan or not.)
I'd not buy a set of any brand of pan but instead look at what it needs to do. My collection doesn't match but it works really well for a wide range of dishes. I have one large heavy non-stick frying pan with a surface I need to nurture. Only plastic or wooden utensils are used, it gets a hand washing, and it can't take oven use. But cleanup is a snap. I have a slightly smaller (10") stainless All-Clad that's perfect for items that need to develop a good seared surface or maybe where you get it started on the stovetop and finished in a hot oven. Non-stick can't do that. Our small 7" frying pan is non-stick yet dishwasher safe and takes fairly harsh treatment. It's a little workhorse. I looked for a long time before finding such a beauty (Analon). The saucier really isn't much different from your standard saucepan but if you're planning to do much whisking or cooking thick liquids I'd really suggest you take a look at it. The subtle difference helps. I wouldn't even think of non-stick here but then I'm a big whisk fan. I think the saucier's shape means it has a little more surface area too, which helps when reducing sauces. But that's not something I do often enough to worry about. I like a big non-stick stockpot for chili and soups, where you don't need to brown but I sure don't want anything to start burning on the bottom. Until about a year ago I had a nice heavy enamel coated Dutch oven but after 30 years the coating gave out and I went to non-stick here too. It's easier to clean, for sure, but I do miss the ability to sear that the iron had. Overall I have a mix of Circulon, Look, Calphalon, Analon, Bernedes, All-Clad, old Farberware and La Creuset. That's more than anyone wants to know about my kitchen cabinets but I was on a roll. My advice to anyone out there just getting started? Don't buy sets.
My collection is modest, and i've bought sets... I started with a $80 set that Consumer Reports really liked (not that i always agree with them) - very thin & light stainless steel with good Al bottom disks to spread heat - 1/2/3 qt. saucepans, 5 qt. dutch oven, 12" deep frypan, & 3 pieces of "stainless steel bottom tupperwear". I hardly ever use a couple of the pieces, but i'm way ahead price-wise anyway, they nest nicely for storage, and they're nice pans. I bought a set of 3 cast-iron fry pans (6.25", 8", & 10.5"). Again, a bit more than needed, but really cheap and they nest. Plus a 2 qt. cast iron "mini-dutch-oven" pot w/lid. Used properly, the cast iron is non- stick (and damage to the non-stick surface is easy & free to fix). It has no problem getting pass-me-the-welding-glove hot to sear meat, and holds heat wonderfully. Oops - for pasta, i've got a cheapo enamel-over-THIN-metal giant-tin-can- shaped pot with lid, hole-ridden pasta insert, & 3-leg colander. I've also got a couple couple-bucks-at-a-garage-sale thick cast aluminum pots - 1 qt. saucepan & large dutch oven - as seldom-used extras. Amusing note: CR's top-rated pot set (Dec02 issue) costs about 4 times what i spend on all mine together, and they aren't dishwasher safe (all mine are, ditto oven).
I bow in reverence to anyone who can make those black iron pans work well. I don't have the patience to take care of 'em. I know, I know, once you get them seasoned they don't need much, but, the couple of times I've tried I've not been able to get over the looks-dirty-but-I-shouldn't- scrub-it hump. For the most part, if it can't take the dishwasher it doesn't join the fleet. The oldest pans I have, which are doing yeoman service, are Farberware saucepans, 1 and 2 quart sizes. I got 'em as starter wedding gifts.
Back in 1975.
My main pot collection is a set of stainless steel-clad iron bottome and part-way up the sides that my mom gave me when I went off to college. They are idendtical to the one sshe had used for 15 years at that point. Ihave 4 sizes of pots, one of which has a double boiler and a steamer insert that also goes in the oven as a casserole. Two copies of the smallest 3/4 qt pot. Big couple gallon dutch oven, 3 sizes of frying pans, all of them with specially designed lids that hold in the steam, but let it burble away in spurts. Nearly waterless cooking can be done with a low flame. I'll think of the manufactureer in a minute. Set augmented by aforementioned 2 Cup sauce pot, three sizes of cast iron skillets, which see far more use than the stainless ones, a 1qt cast iron dutch oven, and a big couple gallon one. These are actually pot, not legged-dutch ovens. A heavy steel wok, and a crepe pan finish up the top-of-stove collection. Actually I have a bunch of pyroceramic casseroles too, but I don't usually reach for them unless I'm going to finish something in the oven.
I bought one of those Visions sets of glass pots and pans way back when I got my first apartment - the saucepans are great for some things, but I haven't used the skillet in years since it is practically worthless (extremely uneven heat transfer). Instead, I have a cheap teflon skillet which gets most of the use, and a cast iron skillet which gets used for a few things like meat. I've also got a pair of the classic stainless Farberware saucepans which see a fair bit of use.
Re #21" Echoware, I have the same set.
Jim discovered when he bought a set of stainless pots and pans from Sears that the big pot and big frying pan used the same cover, ditto for the small pan and pot, so he could not use them both at the same time without having to acquire more lids first.
I used to have some of those Visions glass pots. I loved them except for one thing. They break if you drop them! I dont have them anymore :( You guys sure have a lot of pots. I have 2 sauce pans and some cast iron frying pans (that used to belong to my mother's brother. He bought them in the early 1960's and they are still good! I had to reseason them though). Oh yeah, I have some stainless steel stock pots for making soup but I never get around to it so they have been gathering dust for over 2 years.
Those big stock pots are great for brewing beer! ;) I haven't managed to break any of my Visions pots, although I did chip one of the lids (replaced for $0.80 at a thrift store). And the lid from the big pot & skillet (that shared thing Keesan brought up) fits my cast iron skillet nicely.
Re: #19 I ignore most of the "treat it like thousand-year-old lace" rules on cast iron. I wash 'em with dish detergent & a nylon scrub brush and use metal utensils fairly often in cooking. If the coating looks a bit thin, almost no time is needed to stick a thumb in some oil & rub it around (don't try for more than just wetting the surface). Just-one-slip-and-the-damage-is- permanent (to a far more expensive pan) Teflon sounds worse to me. I don't have a dishwasher (where cast iron shouldn't go), but a few quick swirls with a soapy brush, rinse, & dry with a hot burner or oven doesn't take enough time that it matters.
If there is a bit of rust it is good for you anyway (iron).
re#29 Hahaha. Maybe someday I will try that. yeah, I dont find it too difficult to take care of the cast iron. I wash it with soap sometimes if it needs it. I just make sure it is rinsed well and then I make sure it is dry before I put it away. I never soak it.
I don't soak it (i don't recall that it ever needed soaking anyway) but do sometimes leave semi-liquid foods in cast iron for several days in the fridge - another supposed no-no.
I've one cast-iron skillet; it may have belonged to my grandmother before my mother gave it to me. (I'm fairly certain several of her skillets, which now belong to my brother, belonged to her mother (our grandmother).) We also have one set of Revereware, purchased when we moved here in '87. (Now I wonder what happened to the stuff we had before? Maybe it's boxed up somewhere.) We also have a set of enamel pots and some Corningware casseroles. I used to use the skillet _only_ for corn bread, but lately I've been cooking eggs in it, which works better than cooking them in the stainless steel skillet.
The pans were Eckoware, Flint, or Flintware: "Stainless steel with radiant heat core".
This item is pretty old, but I am now in the market to replace my cast iron skillets, which I love, because the extra iron is supposed to be very bad for men. I don';t want to bother with the "cheap stuff" -- I want to slowly collect a set that can be passed on to my grandkids after yoemens duty in my kitchen. I have one large, flimsy stainless steel pan that burns anythign and everything to replacde and one small omelet pan that has a stainless outside and a heavy core of some sort. It was outrageously expensive...$50 for the omelket pan, lots more for the larger sized pan, but it works beautifully. I'll atick with that brand if I can't find anything as good at a lower price. But I wonderd which skillets you have that have lasted for years, don't burn and stick, and you would replace them witht he same thing if you ahd to do it over again...
I dont know about skillets but I bought an All-Clad sauce pan last year and it is *wonderful*. I imagine that their skillets would be pretty nice.
For omelets I'd most certainly get a non-stick surface, that didn't cost a whole lot, that I'd simply plan to replace ever two years. I don't do high maintenance, hand wash only pans. Non-stick, no matter how much you pay for it, has to be treated to gentle soap and hand washing if you want it to last. For that reason I'd never go All-Clad non-stick. When you don't need non-stick or even want to brown items, All-Clad can't be beat. Your grandchildren will love it for those very rare times they take a sentimental journey and prepare a homemade meal. Have I mentioned lately how much I enjoy my 3 quart saucier? ;-) But what's the deal with iron residue and men's health?
It is time to replace our pressure cooker pot. *sigh* It is missing the rubber pressure release stem.
You can replace the missing piece - they sell replacements in the same kit as the rubber gasket. Might be as much as $8 and if your local hardware store does not have any, try the company's website (also a bit cheaper). Men who eat animals can accumulate too much iron. Plant iron is not absorbed if not needed. I doubt that frying in cast iron will add much iron. Boiling acidic liquids might. Women after menopause who eat animals will have the same problem if they eat too much animal.
Re: #36 The stores i've seen pressure cookers in also carry spare parts. Re: #33 I'd be tempted to get a false I.D. & give blood twice as often as allowed before giving up my cast iron cookware. But my impression from Consumer Reports is that you'd have to cook a LOT of acidic foods in (well-seasoned) cast iron for your body to actually absorb much iron from the pans. If you are going to tearfully pack your cast iron away in your treasure chest, tell us what features you seek in the replacements. Non-stick? Dishwasher safe? Oven safe to moderate temps? Oven safe to high temps? Just some skillets, or other shapes? Lids? Don't-get-hot handles?
Ditto what Mary said - get a $12 teflon pan from the grocery store. Those things are pretty good these days, and I've been using the same cheapy for probably 8 years now.
resp:37 about $8, actually. We might have chanced trying to find it in a thrift store, but we went straight to the Presto site.
I'm sorry I never got back to answer this. We decided to go with all-Clad, and then more research suggested that the iron from cast iron was so poorly absorbed that it wasn't likely to be a problem. (It seems the rumour may have been started by the aluminum industryt, so I unpacked my beloevd cast iron.
Get the All-Clad anyway. It just rocks. :) I have mostly Aluminum-disk bottom Revere, although I do own a small All-Clad frypan that I adore. I own very little non-stick, since I hate the stuff, but I do have a small and a large frypan. I'm going to eventually replace some to all of it with the All Clad, a mix of the plain stainless and the Copper Core. Want a good drool? The copper core AC has copper sandwiched between 2 layers of stainless, not just on the bottom, but all the way up the sides. Expensive as hell, but well worth it. Also, my favorite frypan is probably 30 years old. It's a 12" Corningware frypan with aluminum clad bottom. Aww yeah!
Meg! Cool to see you back. Are you at WS at Briarwood? If so, I'll be stopping in there later today for something. Maybe see you then.
Actually, I'm working at the one in Somerset, as I now live in Royal Oak. Just mostly on Tuesdays, to do shipment. It's a little extra cash, and a nice discount, so it's all worth it. :)
My roommate used my electric hand mixer in my stainless steel pot as a frickin' mixing bowl to make brownies. Now it has a billion circular scratches on the bottom. I know it's not teflon or ultra expensive cladware and is mostly cosmetic, but this pisses me the !@#$!@ off! Am I being unreasonable here?
No. People can do what they like with their own stuff, but they really should be extra-extra careful with other people's. If they're naturally careless, they should be extra-extra-extra careful.
Stainless steel pans are supposed to see signs of use. Unlike non-stick, it's a sign they are used by a real cook (who would mostly avoid non-stick to begin with). Maybe it's just a "car" thing, that the first ding is the worst. Over the next 20 years that pan will take on a patina. My advice, don't worry about it, instead, feel easier about taking it out for some real cooking.
I once had a roommate who bought a cast iron frying pan and then got all uptight about it. He actually made up a list of rules for the frying pan and posted them in the kitchen. But, of course, as twenex mentions in resp:46, this is perfectly ok since it was his frying pan. The rules also made it very clear to us what acceptable uses of the frying pan would be so there was no confusion My response was to go out and get the exact same pan. I used to take great pleasure in washing it in the sink with extra soap and a brillo pad because I know that it bothered my roommate a LOT. But in a good way. I dont think it *really* bothered him but he made a great show of pretending it bothered him because that would encourage me to continue to abuse my own frying pan while leaving his alone ;) Anyhow, the way I see it is this. If you want to be uptight about your pot, make up a list of rules for the pot. Dont expect you roommate to just know that small scratches on the bottom would bother you. It isnt unreasonable that the scratches would bother you but since that probably isnt something that would bother most folks, it is unreasonable to expect your roommate to know that it would bother you. Of course, mary's advice in resp:47 is good too. You'll probably be a lot happier if you dont get bent out of shape because a pot gets bent out of shape ;)
I advocated proper respect for other people's property, not Fascist control of ephemera, like your friend!
Re 48: Finish the story! Which cast-iron pan ended up in better shape????
resp:50 - Ok. *His* cast-iron frying pan ended up in better shape but I just re-seasoned mine occasionally and it was just fine. Guess what is one of the nice things about cast iron frying pans? Even a bozo like me cant ruin them! I eventually gave that pan away though because my grandmother gave me a whole set of them that used to belong to her son who died before I was born. It makes her happy to know that someone is using them. And guess what. Even those these pans are like 75 years old, I still cant ruin them.
Ok, the cast iron pans are only 40 years old. I have caught myself embellishing again ;)
The combination of a well seasoned black iron pan and a silicone spatula/turner and a stainless tong enables a lot of recipes, and can go from searing to baking to sauteeing to boiling/poaching to braising to fridge.
A neighbor just gave us a brand new never used in the wrapping electric fry pan. Aluminum. It sticks far less than the old scratched up one that was no longer fixable.
I used to have a well seasoned round deep dish pizza pan that I loved but don't know what happened to it. So it'd be nice to get some kind if iron pan...
Over the last 40 years I've acquired a nice assortment of high quality pots and pans, but my favorite is a 10" Lodge cast iron skillet that is naturally non-stick at this point. Cost new, today, is about $20.
It's been a lot of years since I've looked at pots and pans in the stores so I have no idea what the higher quality stuff costs. I assume they make cast iron pans that are more like sauce pans or dutch ovens than the more traditional cast iron frying pan? If they do make bigger pans, how would the cast iron affect what you're cooking?
I have an enameled cast iron Dutch oven that's probably 25 years old. That pot has seen a lot of stew, soup and chili over the years. I even use it to make 24 hour no-knead bread. But I'm not so sure it would do what a saucepan needs to do, which is make a quick adjustment to flame adjustments. I prefer multi-ply with a stainless exterior for saucepans. But all of this comes down to personal preference. I'm not a matched set kind of cook. What serves to fry and egg would be terrible at searing steaks at nuclear temperatures.
I do have a couple sauce pans that I use for basic heat-up type things. And one bigger basic pot I use for chili, stew, and soup. Am just wondering if a cast iron dutch oven type thing would work better. I do use a slow cooker for some things but it never produces a good stew nor do I use it for chili. I also have some basic non-stick frying pans in a few sizes and one grill pan [one of those non-stick square frying pans with the raised lines that provide the 'grill' marks. And now that I live at a place that doesn't ban outdoor grills, I do plan on eventually getting a grill, once I can save up the money for a decent one.
You have several choices: