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That Old Ganon posted:He also suggested that I only use cast iron if I have a lot of time in my hands. Agree/disagree? This is silly. I use cast iron for about 90% of my stovetop/oven cooking. There is the same effort of upkeep as with other pans, it's really no big deal - it's sometimes actually even easier to keep clean. Just don't use soap to wash it and you're good.
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Feb 23, 2014 02:06
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MrYenko posted:The upkeep is different, but not any more time consuming than any other pan. Might be faster to clean up, in fact. I'm glad you agree with my post. Cast iron bros for life.   
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Feb 23, 2014 17:06
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psychokitty posted:I have a thing like this. It keeps my bacon flat and evenly cooked in my cast iron skillet. You could also wrap a brick in aluminum foil. These are both great options for panini, too. I would never feel a need to use a press for bacon. Just cook it low and slow and it'll literally be the best bacon ever.
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Feb 24, 2014 23:36
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Paper With Lines posted:I started doing this to make BLTs for a mass audience and tbh, it is better if you have a great cooling rack. If the space between the spokes is sufficiently narrow, then everything cooks evenly, you lose a lot of the unneeded grease and you have more control over the final product. I love using my cast iron, but unless I'm making like three pieces, I'll never cook bacon in it again. I generally use my fifteen incher (  ) and it fits 5-8 pieces quite well. I eat alone. 
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Feb 25, 2014 06:11
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phthalocyanine posted:Aebleskiver pan to make Aebleskiver. Canola oil works fine, so does hydrogenated vegetable shortening (Crisco). Flaxseed oiling your cast iron pan is pretty spergy and not necessary. It is worth mentioning though that my seasoning, while effective, is blotchy and ugly as sin. Nah, it wouldn't 'damage' it. If you use tap water you'll get mineral spotting, if you use distilled it'll probably end up looking pretty good. Either way, smear some bacon fat on it again immediately and you'll be golden. it'll already be loving hot from the baking.
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Mar 11, 2014 19:40
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d3rt posted:I cooked this in my cast iron the other month. Tasted soooooo good. I prefer my chickens to taste of neglect and solitude.
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Mar 16, 2014 03:46
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I would like to know what you did, too. For eating purposes. That looks so good.
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Mar 17, 2014 00:03
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When you make bread and pizza poo poo, salt retards the yeast growth, right? Wouldn't you want to add salt right at the end of things, when you mix it together for the last time, or do you just run the risk of salt not getting evenly dispersed if you wait?
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Mar 19, 2014 04:40
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Bollock Monkey posted:A marinaded steak was cooked in my cast iron pan, which resulted in a bunch of burnt-on crap that I've had to do my best to scrape off using various methods. There are still some bumps but I can't seem to get them off, so I oiled and oven'd it for now to put any seasoning back on that I took off when trying to get the crap off. I was wondering if this was just a peril of cooking marinaded food in cast iron or if there's something I could do to prevent this next time? The sugars will burn, it's not a big deal. Clean it as best you can and then forget about it, it'll come off eventually. If you want to avoid it, don't cook sugary things at such a high heat. I don't know what various methods mean, the best way to clean poo poo stuck on it is to either keep cooking with it, or boil water in the pan and then scrub it out with a hard plastic brush/scrubber. But honestly, though, don't stress the small stuff. Maybe pat dry the meat before putting it in?
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Mar 21, 2014 16:59
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Captain Trips posted:How exactly does cooking bacon help the seasoning, anyway? Is there something I should be doing with the grease, or is it just "cook bacon, receive seasoning"? When the pan gets hot the metal slightly expands, and the grease slithers into those new pores and pocks. THe heat then polymerizes the oil and a hard smooth surface forms, over time and repeated usage. While you're cooking bacon swish the grease around the pan, that's all. When you cook bacon just collect the oil after you're done cooking - I keep a sealed jar in the fridge of the stuff and use it like butter or oil when I cook - and rinse/scrub off the particulates. Once it's clean get the pan hot again and put a spoonful of the grease back into the pan and make sure it coats it evenly, like waterless water. Then cover the pan, turn off the heat and save it for next time you cook. It's good stuff. The bacon fat is also great lightly spread on bread like butter, or dabbed onto vegetables (or just cooked with them, whatever). Just use it anytime you want to use butter for pan cooking stuff. Grilled cheese sandwiches are fantastic.
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Mar 24, 2014 19:57
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Captain Trips posted:I had the grease from last night's bacon in the pan still, and I meant to heat it up slightly so I could just pour it out (didn't know about saving it yet Jesus Christ all this talk of grilled cheese is making me want to make baked macaroni and cheese stuffed breadrolls.
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Mar 24, 2014 20:41
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) but instead I used it to make grilled cheese sandwiches for lunch.
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Dr. Lenin posted:What's the best high heat oil for reseasoning a cast iron pan after discovering your fucktard roommate soaked it and then ran it through the dishwasher, putting it away to only be discovered a few weeks later? Also, would steel wool be recommended for removing rust or should I just use a brillo pad? Bacon let's you eat stuff afterwards, and is perfectly fine. I'd also just use medium grit sandpaper before moving down to steel wool. I never liked using steel wool anyway, it's too flimsy feeling.
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Mar 25, 2014 20:33
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Dr. Lenin posted:doesn't pan out. You're fired.
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Mar 27, 2014 05:35
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Le0 posted:After weeks looking in every store in Switzerland, I finally received the cast iron pan! Cook the steak. The seasoning is a continuous process. Even better, cook some bacon and then use that bacon fat to immediately cook your steak!
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Apr 3, 2014 18:50
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Brocktoon posted:So, I'm planning on buying my first cast iron skillet, possession of which is long overdue at this point. There's one small problem, though, which I forsee causing problems: Are you thinking you need to keep a half-centimeter of oil at the bottom of the pan? Clean it, dry it, get a tiny amount of oil on a towel and lightly rub it into the pan, heat it up again, let it cool, store. Aside from the dust that'll fall into it, there's nothing else in there, certainly nothing there to go rancid. I oil mine somewhat like that because I use it nearly every day. You don't even need to oil it when you put it away. Just be sure to dry it completely before you do. The re-oiling is supposed to help with rust or something, but if it's not wet and being used regularly, gently caress it. Of course, if you're using it regularly then you CAN (lightly) oil it and it won't go rancid. How long would it take to go rancid anyway? A month? If you don't oil it just be sure to oil it before you use it. Not a big deal. So there you go. Also, a lot of people (first timers) who start using Cast Iron always mistake the even heating with even distribution of heat, and gently caress up the first few times when you try to be delicate. get it to temp and keep it there for a little bit and then start cooking delicates. So there's that, too. Good luck. Oh yeah, since you're preheating it anyway there's nothing that'll survive the heat. You're worried about eating the cremated husks of microscopic creatures? Bah. It's a metal pan with carbonized polymer on it. Whatever. It's not as delicate as we like to pretend. 
Drifter fucked around with this message at 21:44 on Apr 3, 2014 |
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Apr 3, 2014 21:39
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onemanlan posted:
Fill the pan with water 1/3 of the way up and then set it to boiling. Let it boil for a minute or two and then anything on the pan will scrub off very easily after. During its boiling you can start to scrape away the poo poo using a metal spatula. I actually just use a normal plastic bristled dish scrubber most of the time, and rarely I'll use the aforementioned metal spatula. You can always just sweat chopped onions with a little oil or something and incorporate the crust mush into it. 
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Apr 6, 2014 18:28
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The Ferret King posted:I've always read you're not supposed to boil water in a cast iron pan. It's ok to do? You can't boil water in a pan? haha. What email from grandma with the funny jokes did you read that from? You wouldn't be able to do ANY cooking if that were the case. But honestly, where'd you read that? Like above, you certainly don't want to leave it wet when you're done, but there's nothing wrong with boiling water.
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Apr 6, 2014 20:35
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Ferret King, I didn't mean to sound disparaging or anything, I was legitimately surprised someone would say you can't cook water in it. Like, you're not supposed to cook a stew or soup or jambalaya or anything else like that? If seasoning is coming off at 212F+water then it's not a proper season to begin with. In that case you just season a little more carefully at a higher heat.BLARGHLE posted:I saw a thing about the making of Le Creuset enameled cast iron cookware on How It's Made, and now I'm really curious about it. I've been wanting a cast iron skillet for a while, but didn't want to deal with seasoning and whatnot. Is this stuff a good, if expensive, alternative? You don't really 'deal' with seasoning, it's just something us You preheat the pan, add a little oil before you add the food and then you're golden. It's certainly an alternative, but I honestly can't see why you'd spend the extra money. I guess enamel might not discolor certain sauces or something, but you shouldn't be using cast iron for delicate little things like that in the first place. Also there are certain reactive/acidic dishes and you don't have to worry at all about rust (just dry the goddamn pan, for real)...but I don't know. Enamel can chip if you're rough with it, and unlike normal CI seasoning which can repair through cooking, you now have a chipped enamel pan. I don't care what you cook with - if you like it, you like it - but it's such a huge price inequality for almost the same thing, in my opinion. To get a good seasoning over time without any fuss you literally just cook with the normal cast iron like normal, but then you rinse it out with a brush and water, put it back on the burner to get it hot and completely dry, and pour a scoonch of oil that you can spread around the hot pan (you can wipe it down with a cloth or paper towel) and then let the whole thing cool down. Drifter fucked around with this message at 00:07 on Apr 7, 2014 |
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Apr 7, 2014 00:00
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Captain Trips posted:The girl is staying here for the weekend, so I told her I'd make pancakes on Sunday morning. Is it such a small pan or are you just making giant fuckoff pancakes? I've never made a pancake that touched the side of my pans. Maybe I should start increasing my pancake volume. I do love pancakes.
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May 15, 2014 23:51
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bartlebee posted:So I picked this up and tried doing scrambled eggs in it. I've read through the thread, but I suppose I took the "preseasoned" claim too seriously and totally hosed up the eggs. I'm assuming the correction to this is to scrub the burnt egg off of it with steel brush and season it myself? Not a steel brush. Put some water about an inch up and then boild it. Then just scrub it with a plastic brush. Use a steel wool thing to clear off the preseason, but a steel brush is like using a handful of toothpicks. Season it yourself of course.
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May 30, 2014 23:36
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Democratic Pirate posted:I'm about to go to a ranch for Labor Day weekend where the SOP is get drunk until 3am, then wake up by 7:30 and cure the hangover with bacon, sausage and eggs all cooked in the same cast iron skillet. It's the way it's been and the way it will always be. You'd feel double better if you drink a shitton of water before you go to sleep. Then you can enjoy your eggs and bacon without the Warhammer of Damocles bashing you in the face every two minutes. Also a giant morning pee.
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Aug 28, 2014 17:00
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d3rt posted:Mix some powerade or gatorade in there too. The last thing you need is sugar and all that other poo poo in there. Water's just perfect.
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Aug 28, 2014 22:01
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d3rt posted:theres no sugar in my powerade or gatorade. it's actually quite helpful to drink it, but to each their own. It's got electrolytes. It's what plants need.
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Aug 28, 2014 22:29
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psychokitty posted:I hate to correct you, but it's actually what plants crave. I know, I sound gay. No no, if I'm going to sarcastically quote a movie to poke fun at someone's beliefs, I should at least have the correct quote. Thanks for looking out. I had just watched the thing like 6 months ago, too. I should drink more gatorade to help with my memory.
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Aug 30, 2014 15:40
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Massasoit posted:After putting 6 or 7 coats of seasoning on my pan, it looked pretty drat good. I cooked in it, and it seems like some of the seasoning on the cooking surface came off - and thats the only area it did. The seasoning on the walls of the pan and on the outside seems pretty good still. Not sure if I should strip it and start over again or just try to keep seasoning it - but right now it doesn't seem like anything is sticking to certain spots. You put six coats on before you started cooking with it? Wow. What did you cook in it? Cast iron takes a while to evenly warm up, so give it a few minutes at heat before you put stuff in, at least until you get used to it. Just use the darn thing, and give it time. You'll be fine.
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Sep 7, 2014 00:26
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Yeah, you just want to avoid soaking it for hours/overnight if possible. A wipe on/wipe off type of soaping doesn't do anything to the seasoning unless it was lovely to begin with. However, a better to clean is just to bring water to a boil in the pan and then use a plastic bristled brush. Hot water loosens poo poo up like nobody's business. And even better way to deal with stuck on food it is to just cook in it again later. Saute onions or something, because then you have a clean pan an you get to eat sauteed onions. Drifter fucked around with this message at 23:18 on Sep 9, 2014 |
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Sep 9, 2014 23:16
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Biscuit Joiner posted:Cast iron is actually pretty fragile as far as metals go. It's easy to break with a hammer and dropping it on a hard surface will also break it. Did they snap off right along the 'made in china' stamps?
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Sep 10, 2014 03:59
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Biscuit Joiner posted:You cant stamp cast iron, it will break. Try to keep up with the rest of the class. The rest of the class must've been held back or something, then, because my ironware takes a beatin' and keeps on heatin'.
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Sep 10, 2014 07:02
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Darth Windu posted:What sort of brush do you want? I keep going thru sponges which my life partner throws away because they get messed up after cleaning my cast iron. I have a metal brush for my grill but I assume that isn't appropriate.  I'm not entirely sure what you're asking, but any sort of plastic-bristled dish washing brush is fine for your cast iron - the tougher the plastic the better. Could even be a vegetable/potato brush. It really doesn't matter, just don't brush the pan while it's still 400F+. Whatever you use, it's easiest to keep it dedicated to your cast iron.
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Sep 23, 2014 04:23
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Safety Dance posted:A metal brush should also, in theory, be fine. You're theory's wrong. The 'cook with it' mantra is for people trying to produce a useful layering of season but overthinking the process. And it's true. In spite of what you say there's a point where you probably don't deliberately want to gently caress up a thing that takes time to develop. Seasoning is tough, but when you have the option of NOT even remotely possibly hurting it with a stiff plastic brush, why wouldn't you go with that? Drifter fucked around with this message at 08:15 on Sep 23, 2014 |
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Sep 23, 2014 08:13
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Safety Dance posted:So is there a significant difference between using a metal brush and a metal spatula? yes. How on earth do you use your spatulas? Like a chisel?
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Sep 23, 2014 17:59
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Butch Cassidy posted:The thought of cleaning an iron measuring cup covered in honey or molasses is the stuff of nightmares. Just throw it in a fireplace overnight. ...and then a smelting pot.
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Sep 25, 2014 16:57
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You can make one chicken pot pie at a time.
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Oct 2, 2014 22:34
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Paper With Lines posted:Maybe a small amount of popcorn? Would cast iron be too hot for popcorn? I think it wouldn't be as easy to or as quick as if you just used stainless steel or aluminum. And a thing that size would literally make three mouthfuls of popcorn, tops. I know you can, but unless it's the only type of pan you have I wouldn't bother with cast iron for something like that.
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Oct 2, 2014 23:39
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BraveUlysses posted:Dutch babies. Dutch Babies are the best kind of thing to cook in your skillet. But you might have better luck obtaining a Chinese or Russian one.
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Oct 21, 2014 01:11
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Heners_UK posted:Actually, anyone found a less-than-wirebrush for burnt on food that doesnt somehow damage seasoning? Any sort of stiff plastic dish brush will work fine. And just pour some water in the thing and let it boil up - it'll soften the burned on poo poo and you can pretty much just wipe it off. Or just rinse it off and cook something else on it soon. Who would use a metal brush? It's not a wire rack for a charcoal grill or anything.
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Oct 28, 2014 04:22
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KirbyJ posted:Tried sous vide steaks in a dry cast iron pan that I preheated on a high burner for 10 mins. Steaks came out with a VERY uneven crust that was almost burnt in some parts and unbrowned in others; worse, doing so seems to have stripped some of the seasoning I had on the pan, which has a much lighter patch in the middle now. Is this because my pan hasn't seen much action and I just need to COOK MORE BACON, or am I doing something very wrong here? You probably don't need to preheat for that long to begin with, but whatevs - it's fine. You may not have let it sit still for long enough, generally that's what happens when stuff sticks to the pan. How did you sear it? Safflower oil/lard for 30 seconds a side? Dry? More time? Was the steak flat or did part of it curl from the heat?
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Oct 28, 2014 05:19
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Baron Fuzzlewhack posted:I sometimes find myself with a desire for a cast iron lid for my skillet. It's not frequent enough for me to buy myself, so it would make a good gift! Make it a gift for yourself.
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Oct 30, 2014 17:14
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Butch Cassidy posted:Ever pull a skillet/sauce pan/whatever out of the oven and soon after absentmindedly grab the handle to move it, but it your hand? when this happens to me I grip it even tighter to teach my hand a lesson. You're in the Danger Zone, not a Day Care Center.
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Nov 3, 2014 18:10
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wormil posted:I have an infrared thermometer but never thought to use it in the kitchen. What are some other ways to use it besides checking pans? *oil temp for shallow frying. *liquid temps where there's no vapor, like less than 170F - yogurt or milk or chocolate, too. The laser refracts off the mists instead of making it through to the actual liquid. *Oven temp.
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Nov 4, 2014 04:43
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