To me, someone who celebrates a bit more of the spectrum than most: Metal hot. Make food hot.
Non-stick means easier cleanup, but my wife seems to think cast-iron is necessary for certain things (searing a prime rib roast, for example.).
After I figure those out, then I gotta figure out gas vs. electric vs. induction vs infrared…
Stainless steel can be plenty nonstick but you have to get it good and hot. Seasoned cast iron is a little more forgiving, but heavy. Carbon steel may be the best of both world because it’s similar in weight to stainless, but takes a season, but I don’t have enough experience with it yet to say for sure.
I use my cast iron for non stick operations and my stainless for fond sauces and acidic dishes.
Next time with stainless try this: bring a little oil to smoke point, wipe the pan dry, back on the heat. Then add cold oil and your food. It’s pretty nonstick, but it only lasts for one use.
I bet this works nominally better, but I just heat the pan with oil. I can’t be arsed to wipe screaming hot oil out of a pan only to reintroduce new cold oil and have to contemplate whether it could possibly make a difference and either feeling like an idiot for blindly following such an absurd direction, or like an idiot for not understanding the scientific grounds for which it works.
Under certain conditions, thin layers of oil polymerize and bond to a surface. It’s the same mechanism as cast iron, but smooth stainless steel holds onto the coating more tenuously than cast iron.