
A Memory Like Cast Iron Pans - liquidise
http://blog.benroux.me/cast-iron-pans/
======
dalke
"You don't wash cast iron pans."

Except that you do. See [http://www.seriouseats.com/2014/11/the-truth-about-
cast-iron...](http://www.seriouseats.com/2014/11/the-truth-about-cast-
iron.html) , which points out there are a number of myths to do with cast iron
pans, and says one of the things to do is:

> Clean it after each use. Clean your pan thoroughly after each use by washing
> it with soap and water and scrubbing out any gunk or debris from the bottom.
> I use the scrubby side of a sponge for this.

"The most important reason is that food cooked in a cast iron pan adds a
character to it. It starts to shape the flavor of what you will cook in the
pan later on."

On the flip side, quoting from
[http://articles.latimes.com/1999/may/12/food/fo-36243](http://articles.latimes.com/1999/may/12/food/fo-36243)
:

> From the 1930s through the '60s, Americans were convinced you had to have a
> certain kind of bowl to make a proper green salad: a plain, unvarnished
> wooden bowl which could never be washed. The idea was that the wood "cured"
> over the years, making ever more exquisite salads. Actually, the dressing
> seeped into the wood and the oil turned hideously rancid, so the bowls stank
> to high heaven.

> A sly foodie named George Rector had simply hoaxed the whole country. He'd
> invented the myth of the wooden salad bowl to spice up a story in the Sept.
> 5, 1936, issue of the Saturday Evening Post.

> Playing on Americans' fear of snobbish French gourmets, he painted green
> salad as the most finicky dish of all. And the secret of the perfect salad?
> Rubbing a clove of garlic on a wooden bowl, which would give just enough
> garlic flavor but not (horrors!) too much . . . and then never washing the
> bowl.

> The French themselves had never believed any such thing. In fact, Parisian
> gourmets didn't even like garlic in their salads--as Rector knew perfectly
> well, since he'd worked in Parisian restaurants. In his cookbooks, he had
> published garlic-free French salad recipes.

Sounds like exactly the same belief.

