Anybody use a Jacob Bromwell?:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Steel-FRYING-PAN-6-Made-in-USA-JACOB-BROMWELL-FREE-SHIPPING-6-inch-skillet-NEW-/271533014518?hash=item3f38a0fdf6:g:NYcAAOSwFTRTrG4h
Looks good from reviews, can't complain about the price and made in the USA.
I was at a Cabella's a couple weeks ago. They had some excellent prices on the bigger skillets. And there was one skillet that would cover your whole stove. That was cool.
bigdaddylee82 wrote: We took a gamble on William Sonoma's house brand non-stick skillets. We bought the 2 piece set, a 9" and 11" (I think) skillet, no lids. They're made by Scanpan, in fact I bought a Scanpan lid off Amazon for the larger pan. The pans are ceramic coated, not Teflon, advertised as dishwasher and metal utensil safe. I haven't stuck them in the dishwasher, they're super easy to clean thanks to the no-stickiness, even burnt cheese comes off with ease. I have sparingly used metal utensils a few times, but I normally use wood, plastic, or silicone coated utensils in everything anyway. They'll be a year old in January, so far they're my go to, have been used a lot, and look good as new.
I use Scan Pan and cast iron. Love them both. Scan pan was able to pry me away from the cast iron due to how easy it is to clean. Coating has taken a beating from my girlfriend who enjoys cooking like some sort of non-stick hating savage with metal utensils and is totally fine.
I will join in on the cast iron band wagon. HOWEVER I have got most of my stuff from antique shops. I always find them in the back in the pile of stuff that they let go for $.50 each. I have also got a couple dutch oven's and cast iron pans with tops. These are fantastic. Being older aka antiques they have a good carbon build up and the tops seal really well. That combined with the weight is netting me low presser cooking that speeds up cooking as compared to a standard pot with a glass top.
On the flip side to this I have a couple stainless steel professional grade pans that are copper clad. These are fantastic. Definitely not nonstick but the heat transfer and even heating is great and like cast iron they can to from the stove to the oven (how I "pan fry" steak)
Cast iron properly seasoned and cared for will do everything you need. I use a 10" skillet and a 16" depending on how much food I'm making. I also have an enamel Le Creuset for more delicate things like eggs and couple copper pots of varying size. This has saved me well and I basically make three meals a day at home, very rarely eating out. None of this is cheap, but it's the kind of thing you buy once and never need to worry about it again.
In reply to clutchsmoke:
I inherited some of my mother's cast iron, it's at least as old as me, likely older, I have a stainless All Clad Emeril set, and I made SWMBO buy some cookware for her apartment when we started dating, she didn't/doesn't cook, and she bought a Paula Dean set at Walmart.
The Paula Dean set was E36 M3, I think we only have the stock pots left, none of the nonstick stuff lasted, we ate or washed off most of the Teflon.
The All Clad/Emeril stainless set was a graduation present, I went from T-fal/Walmart level to that, what a huge difference. I have taken darn good care of it, but the big skillet has pitted in a few places. I guess All Clad at Emeril prices doesn't get you All Clad quality.
My cast iron gets used some, mostly for occasional meats, corn bread, and stuff I want to get a good roux from. They have more sentimental value than intrinsic value though.
Those Scanpan/William Sonoma though, are like magic. If I had more room in the cupboard I'd add a few more. In reality I could use a larger/deeper fry pan, and will likely add one to my collection after Christmas.
I won't use nonstick or aluminum, I'm crazy enough already. I have a good collection of cast iron and it works well if seasoned correctly. You can also find carbon steel pans which are like lightweight cast iron and need to be seasoned. Haven't used them myself but they use them in restaurants. Good luck.
Love Cast Iron, the OLD stuff is smooth and not nearly as heavy due to the better quality of iron used. I have a smooth glass top stove and never have a problem with my pans on it. Handle covers make for easy use when hot, cleanup is veg oil and kosher salt, hot water and a good drying off with a towel. Good for bacon, eggs, hash browns, anything that is not tomato based or has lemon juice in it like scampi.
If you have one that needs cleaning, get a big heavy duty trash bag, easy off oven cleaner, spray all sides, seal in the bag and let it sit. Check it and re-apply oven cleaner as necessary. Keep all that smelly E36 M3 outside during all of this. Once the greasy and baked on crud is gone you can perform some magic to remove rust and then reseason with crisco layers. THIN crisco layers applied to a preheated 400 pan. You want to bring that pan up to temp slowly, increase the temp by 75° every 20 min or so. Apply melted crisco with a pastry brush and then wipe with a terrycloth towel that you do not care about until almost dry and place upside down on the oven rack. Bake for 30 min per layer, wipe to dry after each layer. Crank to 500 for final 30 min and let cool completely in the oven.
My parents received cast iron pans for a wedding gift. That was almost 40 years ago and my dad still uses them.
Also.....everything tastes better when made on cast iron
Aluminum cookware is safe! Yes some aluminum leaches into your food when you cook with it but there is way more aluminum in some the foods you cook in that pan then the pan adds to it. If you take antacids you are taking in way more aluminum then you would with just cooking with aluminum cookware.
That said I do like cast iron, I use both as well as SS and non-stick pans, but the last for eggs only.
We recently went from some ultra cheapo non-stick garbage to a nice Cuisinart stainless set, and there were a few nice pans in there. If you follow the instructions, they are not terrible to clean. I like to do eggs and chicken cutlets, which both destroyed my non-stick stuff over time. Eggs are the hardest to clean. I let teh pan soak for a little bit and clean with a stiff brush. And the best part: any gunk on them can be taken off safely by steel wool.
I also have a Lodge ridged bottom pan and a dual sided two-burner cast iron skillet. The pan usually gets used for steaks, and kicks butt for that. The skillet is a PITA and likes to fill my house with smoke, so I rarely use it. Both get seasoned regularly.
In reply to EastCoastMojo:
Your mention of handle covers reminds me, they're great but as common sense would dictate DO NOT keep using the cloth ones when they get worn out on the hot end. The other day I had an omelette finishing up on low, turn around to check something for a minute, come back and half the cover is on fire.
I tried it this morning on the cast iron pan, and it worked! I was surprised that it was decidedly less sticky than my worn out teflon pan.
I will have trouble getting SWMBO on board though. For one thing, it was smokey. Now I use this cast iron pan for lots of things, probably most often searing and grilling, so it's possible that it was just dirty. I had not heard of using the salt-cleaning method before this thread, and so I tried it and it indeed looks dramatically cleaner now. Perhaps the smoke won't be so bad next time.
Thanks!
My daily used cast iron pans produce no smoke.
I suggest you get a good "seasoning" on yours.
Crisco coated and then in the oven for 2 hrs at 300 degrees will do fine. Do that one time and you'll be golden.
Afterwards, cool and swipe out the excess with paper towel. Final rinse with just water and some slight uses of a steel wool pad (no soap).
I love cast iron because I understand the thermal benefits of such pans. The wife hates them cause they are heavy and ugly.
Seems to be a common split when it comes to cast iron pans.
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