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.
I recently learned how to cook non-stick with my stainless steel pan [1]. Needless to say it's a bit more involved, but I felt more accomplished when I figured out how to cook with it.
Pros: SS can go right in the dishwasher, it's safe & you can use metal spatula, no worry about loss of efficacy over the years.
Cons: It takes a minute more to prep, harder to clean (sides/edges aren't non-stick)
Personally, between this option and carbon-steel pre-seasoned, I see no reason to own Teflon pans.
Although, I did hear that linoeic acid in excess may be detrimental for brain development (and may be one of a handful of reasons that neurodivergence appears to be on the rise). And more than just refined sugar, excess calories make you fat, which both LA and RS have a tendency towards making us eat in excess.
You need fat on 'nonstick' too. This is another common myth.
Sure, your T-Fal pan will "release a fried egg" instantly for the first 20~30 fried eggs, but then they will start sticking as the coating naturally erodes into your food and your body (including the adhesives that make a 'non-stick' surface adhere to metal). A splash of olive oil is all you need, and olive oil it is one of the healthiest foods out there.
cast iron is so slow and its seasoning is so tedious to build and maintain. I can only really see good reason to use if you cook a LOT of steak or similar. I exclusively use SS, but am I wrong? What am I missing from CI?
Seasoning cast iron has been rather easy, and you can get preseasoned pans as well. My method is: scrub a new (unseasoned) pan well with hot water and a brillo pad, being sure to thoroughly get into any grooves. This is to remove the wax coating present on some pans and to clean any potential surface rust. From there I preheat my oven to 450°F/230°C with my pan inside, this helps drive off any remaining moisture. Once its to temp I pull the pan out and give it a thin coating of flaxseed oil before putting it in the oven upside down for 30min. I do this 6 times, flipping the pan each time, but really 3-4 times is enough. And any fat is also good, I simply prefer flax because it has the best polymerization, which is a debatable quality. I’m just excessive and cast iron collection is a bit of a hobby. After the initial seasoning all you need to do is store your pans in a thin layer of oil if you won’t use them for long period, but even that isn’t a real problem for properly seasoned pans. I’ve never had a pan I seasoned rust.
As for what you’re missing: nothing for cooking smaller foods, but it is unmatched for baking and frying. I’ve found it to be a lot more capable in keeping oil temps consistent and giving good crusts to pan pizzas and cornbreads. So if deep dish pizzas, breads, seared/fried meats and veggies, and huevos ahogados sound good I’d definitely recommend having at least one 10-12” pan around.
> Needless to say it's a bit more involved, but I felt more accomplished when I figured out how to cook with it.
The rituals and sense of accomplishment. Teflon is very convenient, when it fails you buy a new one, RVS takes a bit more expertise and cast iron is even more of an adventure, it gets better over time, last many generations. It is different in that it heats very slowly but also stays hot when you put it on the table. Nice for slow dining and/or foods that don't stay warm for long. If the handle is also iron you can put it in the oven. You get to cook different dishes that go from the stove in the oven.
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.
Or do you perform a quick season on the cooktop right before frying / searing? In that case, you could also use stainless steel cookware, which is even less maintenance than carbon steel.
Isn’t carbon steel more maintenance heavy than cast iron? I was always told that you always need to coat carbon steel after use otherwise it will oxidize, while cast iron has a protective polymerized coating that helps it to resist that naturally, and in my experience this has held true where CS equipment oxidizes readily (and stains from acids) while cast iron has more leeway due to the initial coating.
All non-stick frying pans die within a year or so. We recently took the plunge and invested in a stainless steel one. Yes, it takes some (very little) time to adjust your cooking style, but that thing comes with a lifetime guarantee and you don't have to worry about accidentally scratching the surface. Win-win.
Stainless steel can and will stick to some food, but a good one can hold very high amounts of heat and will heat up very evenly.
I think at the end, it boils down to cooking style and preference. We use both (non-stick and stainless steel), and some foods are easier to prepare in one w.r.t to other, however, nothing is impossible in either.
All non stick coatings require care though. Never scrape with metal, do not wash in the dishwasher, and do not overheat.
The rule 0 of item maintenance is, "if you care for your item, your item cares for you when you need it".
cast iron pans contain two materials, the seasoning (oxidized and polymerized food oils, occasionally oxidized iron) and the pan itself (an iron-carbon-silicon alloy, potentially with impurities).
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
No they don't. How can you even say that with a straight face? Scuffing the surface != damage.
There's a big difference between cooking on a piece of metal, and cooking on a multiple layers of chemicals invented by the aerospace industry; or overheating a metal spatula or overheating utensils made from recycled electronics' plastic.
This idea that it is impossible to cook without all this over-engineered, hyper-marketed, disposable, mass-produced QVC crap is utter nonsense.
Nobody needs teflon, or nylon, or plastic too cook with. You can cook perfectly fine with centuries old technology. The same way the people who invented the recipes cooked centuries ago.
Seriously lol, the effort vs risk ratio is insanely in favor of getting rid getting rid of plastic spatulas. Though, it should be pretty obvious even before this study that plastic, heat, and ingesting the result do not go together.
you're only focusing on the immediate, literal replacement cost though; what if (and there are as credible papers as this one, stating so) using a metal spatula on my teflon pan causes it to get into my food and that's what will kill me? Or various metals are an even bigger health risk?
>> should be pretty obvious even before this study that plastic, heat, and ingesting the result do not go together.
Metal spatulas are also just better. Plastic or silicone ones are like safety scissors, so of course you need non-stick pans. I don't run into sticking with cast iron and a metal spatula.
You are using them for the wrong purpose... Plastic spatulas are useful for sauces, batter, anything of that consistency. Of course, if you are already holding it in your hand and you need to flip a pancake, there's nothing wrong with it...
Similarly, there are plenty of different metal spatulas for different purposes, like decorating cakes or cooking on one big stove-top (as opposed to individual burners, that's something you see in the restaurant kitchens more often than in private use). And, again, you don't have to use any specific one for any specific task. My mom never had a spatula and did everything with a single chef knife she had, and it still worked for her.
At the very least, there’s about a 100% chance of microplastics getting into your food when using these things under heat. You can argue about the risks all day, but I imagine most people would want to avoid this bioaccumulation if possible.
This is my take as well. Can I avoid microplastics? No. Can I make simple household decisions that minimize my intake? Yes. Stainless pots and pans, stainless or wooden tools, stainless silverware, ceramic plates and bowls.
Yes, it takes slightly longer to clean some stuff up, but at least I'm not eating as much plastic/PTFE.
Try out carbon steel if you haven't. Season it once and it's essentially non-stick -- all I do is give mine a light rinse for a few seconds and then towel dry.
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.
> do people really cook in non-stick pans without any sort of oil?
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?
Oh lol, yeah, I wouldn't use olive oil on pancakes. That's definitely a butter situation.
As for high heat with olive oil, I'm not sure about it being unhealthy or not. I just found this overview [1], and it seems like there isn't great evidence. I again hadn't considered it, since it's something my ancestors have done for thousands of years. Sample size of one family, but my grandmother lived to her 90s and my great-aunt is still walking around Paris in her mid-90s!
