Ask Lemmy

I've been enjoying my carbon steel more than cast iron. It's the same as cast iron for seasoning and non stick, but much lighter.

Induction FTW and cast iron does work the best with induction since it heats up the most. However, I also enjoy non-stick since it being slower is an OK trade-off for the easy cleanup

The cast-iron I've been using for the past 16 years was probably made in the 1940's in Ontario and will likely still be around after I die, unless someone leaves it in the rain or something. With coated pans I'd have to buy new ones every four years or so (which is not only costly but environmentally unfriendly)... not to mention the health risks of using non-stick, which are negligible IF you never forget it on a hot burner; it will overheat and the coating will break down and leach into your food.

Gas ranges also release toxins into the air which can only be properly extracted if you cook under a fume hood, like one you might find in a chemistry lab... even the best kitchen exhaust fans can't exchange the air that well and you're left breathing in carcinogens everyday when you cook your meals. So, if one uses a coated pan on a gas stove... well.

IMO the best choices are anything except coated pans on an induction stove. I read somewhere induction stoves are more efficient but I've never actually looked into it. Cast irons can certainly be a pain in the ass to maintain, but once you get a good coating on there it's smooth cooking until something acidic is cooked with it, or a roommate puts it in the dishwasher for you... which is why it's good to also have a steel pan also. I've never eve heard of copper pans lol, sounds expensive.

I don't like non-stick anymore because the coating eventually gets all scratched up and doesn't work as good. Idk how it gets scratched up, I never used metal. My ex did, so maybe it was her.

Cast Iron, if maintained well (i.e just don't cook anything too acidic. You don't usually need to re-season), lasts forever. It's also great for when you want to sear something without the pan cooling down once you put your food on it. Because it's thick and stores a bunch of heat. Yet somehow it also gets hot pretty fast.

I don't get stainless steel personally. Apparently to get things to not stick, I should be using MORE heat? But I already use a lot of heat! On the up side, they get hot really fast.

Copper and carbon steel I've never used. I hear carbon steel is similar to cast iron in many ways, but easier to maintain?

If you're doing a new build, definitely go induction. Electric sucks because it's kinda slow-ish to get started, gas sucks because either you need to have a gas line built to your house if you don't already have one, or you change out the gas container every now and then (and that thing is heavy, mine's 17 KG of gas + whatever the huge chunk of metal weighs, which is definitely more than 17 KG). Plus the whole issue of, y'know, freshly burnt hydrocarbons (yay CO2 and potentially other gases). Oh and gas explosions aren't common, but they can happen!

Only downside of induction is that if you lose power, you can't cook. A wood-burning stove as a backup is excellent in this case, because depending on what your heating system is, you may also lose heating if power is gone.

Cast iron is great if you use it a lot. It does take a little more work to maintain because after you clean it it's best if you dry it and coat it with a thin layer of oil, but you don't have to if you use it all the time. Mine is non stick enough to fry an egg with no oil, so it's better than my old ass Teflon pans in that sense, but probably not as good as a new Teflon pan

Cast iron pans are fucking heavy. As soon as I tried picking one up, I knew I don't want to cook with that on a regular basis.

I have gone through several non stick pans and they all suck because they will wear out relatively quickly. Eventually things will start to stick, and then you are in trouble because you have to treat them gently to avoid scraping off the nonstick coating, so you end up in a catch 22 situation where you can't actually scrub stuff off without making it worse.

I switched to a stainless steel pan about a year ago and I love it. The weight is somewhere in between cast iron and most nonstick pans. I've never had anything get horribly stuck to it, and it's not difficult to clean because you can use abrasive sponges or whatever without damaging it.

For gas vs. electric vs. induction vs. infrared:

I've never cooked on gas so I can't speak to it. I always had normal electric ranges.

Then I got an induction stovetop and it was a game changer. Instead of using a heating element to heat the pot, it uses magnets to agitate the atoms in the cookware and that turns the pot into a heater.

For example, I can boil a pot of water in 2 minutes, faster than a microwave.

The downside is you HAVE to use magnetic pans for it to work (like cast iron.) If you have, say, an aluminum pan, you have to get a stainless steel plate, which will heat the pan and the pan heats the food, just like a normal electric stove.

Infrared works the same way as electric, it heats the pot which heats the food.

Sadly, metal hot make food hot is not the only factor. It's also the speed and responsiveness of the pan. If you have the money, look into 3-ply pans, stainless bottom (for induction, but works with everything), aluminum interior (for eveness of heat throughout the pan) and stainless interior/cooking surface. I've had some of my pans for 40 years and they look brand new. They're just as easy to clean as non-stick, if you use wooden utensils for a quick scrape before cleaning. All-clad is probably the best brand, I bought some recently, and they are just as good as the old ones I have, very rare these days. They can be found on eBay and craigslist used, and the used are just as good (have a few of those as well).

I love my cast iron pans, especially for searing and tortillas, but for sauces and risottos, 3-ply is a great option. It's really about the responsiveness.

Last thing, ceramisised cast-iron (like Le Creuset) is terrific for deep frying.

Give cast iron a try. It's cheap, lasts forever, and can be just as non stick as any "non stick" pan. Just clean it out and oil it again after use.. Or leave it be.. I'm not here to start a cast iron cleaning war

As someone who learned way more about pans than I really want to know, let me say that a good cook can make good food in any pan, however some pans are more suited to tasks than others.

First off, searing meat in a non-stick pan (traditionally Teflon) is a bad idea, the pan can reach temperatures that produce toxic gases, and are known to kill birds that are more sensitive to them than we are. The coating that makes them nonstick isn't very durable and will at most last a few years before being useless. While other kinds of pans are likely to outlive you.

Other common pans include cast iron, stainless steel, carbon steel, and ceramic non-stick (non-toxic, but are delicate)

Specifically for searing meets, my favorite is stainless steel. It holds heat similar to cast iron, but is slightly more conductive and can transfer a lot of heat to sear meat. Meat also literally bonds to pan and can be used to make great flavorful sauces with deglazing. Cleanup is easy, if anything is really stuck just boil water in it to loosen. Alternatively stainless steel holds up decent in a dishwasher. Cleanup can't be easier than automatic. However, stainless steel is still quite heavy.

For general purpose cooking my personal favorite is carbon steel. It's seasoned like cast iron and can be quite nonstick, but is much lighter making it feel very similar to nonstick pans, which are made with aluminum.
I won't lie, seasoning has a learning curve. Seasoning is very tough under some circumstances, and very delicate under others. Notably acid will eat the seasoning away.

Cast iron is great, but it is so heavy that it is inconvenient to use.

All will work with induction, except for cheap aluminum nonstick pans

It's only better in two things: longevity and taste. Maybe the two most important things for a cooking utensil.

Duck non-stick.

Treated myself to Le Creuset and will probably never have to buy something again lol.

Consumer reports does a non-stick pan test where they fry an egg without oil repeatedly until it starts to stick. The point is that normal use degrades non stick surfaces, so every non-stick pan, no matter how fancy, will one day be garbage.

Don't get me wrong, I use both non-stick and metal surface pans. I think they both have their place, but I think of non-stick pans as expendable.

Sometimes it's not about metal hot. It's about how fast or slowly metal gets hot.

A lot of pans are made of stamped sheet metal and quite thin. They get hot very fast, they cool down very fast. With something like a gas burner, you can get a ring of very hot metal where the flames are, and relatively cool metal everywhere else.

Cast iron is thicker, and has a lot more thermal mass. It heats up slower, it evens that heat out, and it hangs onto that heat.

If you were to try to bake cornmeal in a sheet steel pan, it would burn. The metal would get too hot too fast. I prefer cast iron for making rues as well, because you get much more even heat.

Sometimes you do want a lighter pan for concentrated high-heat applications. Woks are designed for cooking over a very hot, very concentrated flame so there's one very hot spot in the pan, perfect for stir frying.

If you know what you're doing, you can cook non-stick in a stainless pan, it just takes some oil. Famously, cast iron pans can be "seasoned" or coated with a thin layer of extremely smooth polymerized oil which forms a non-stick surface, like DIY teflon.

So, honestly, I would recommend having a couple of each and choose the pan for the kind of cooking you're doing.

Non stick: alright for eggs and other relatively low temperature stuff. Make sure you only use rubber, plastic, or other soft utensils, and never clean it with a scraper or steel wool. The surface of the non stick is fine as far as I know, but if you go deeper by getting too hot or scraping with something too hard, you can expose the toxic chemicals.

Stainless: my go to. Use whatever utensils you want, and clean it however you want. The main thing to make it non stick is heat the pan up hot enough that when you splash a bit of water on it, it beads up and scatters. Then use plenty of oil. The main downside is you usually can't put them in the oven.

Cast iron: better in use than stainless, but harder to clean. Upside is you can use whatever with them, and you can swap between oven and stove. Downside is you can't clean them the same way as anything else.

The solution to all this mess is to buy good quality pans that meet your cooking needs and learn how to care for them, I have cast iron that belonged to my grandparents, I also have good nonstick pans,stainless pans and carbon steel they all have their uses. But if someone just wants a pan and doesn't cook alot I would go with carbon steel, it's more expensive, but you will probably only buy it once, (Vimes boots)and it does most thing well enough.

I can’t comment on the various toxicities…but I was a high-end chef for 20 years. Stainless (proper stainless, with a high quality underside) and cast iron pans were essential for their respective purposes. Non-stick pans generally weren’t used outside of breakfast in kitchens without a flattop. Copper was a gimmick for homeowners…never saw one in a kitchen. My understanding was the copper was on the outside and the shtick was it was supposed to regulate heat better…BS AFAIK…it just made them look slick and therefore easier to sell.

Stainless are the go-to for searing and sautées…nothing is going to stick if you know what you’re doing and monitor the pan. Cast iron was for things you started on the stovetop and moved to the oven to finish…and/or for things you blacken or crust. In my experience the same effect can be achieved with a stainless pan (never buy a pan with a plastic handle that can’t go in the oven and always cook with a hot-cloth)…but some chefs swear by cast iron for niche purposes and they’re certainly easier to clean and last longer, even if they’re useless for sauteeing (square shape).

Oh…woks can compliment stainless pans for sauteeing if you have people who know what they’re doing with them…you pretty much can’t leave a wok unattended…but they get the best results for what they’re made for (stir fry, fried rice, etc).

Gas is the only choice for proper heat regulation. All the other elements are out of the question for proper cooking.