Over my years I’ve owned many types of non-stick pans. Judge me as you see fit, but I’ve owned Teflon, stainless steel, ceramic, and cast iron pans, but none of them seem to stay “non-stick” for more than a few years. I’ve had the best luck with cast iron, but my wife doesn’t like to use them because they’re heavy. I hand wash them all with soap and water, but they all seem to lose their ability to shed off what I cook in them. Does anyone have any recommendations for a good non-stick pan?
EDIT: It seems like the consensus is on cast iron, or ceramic steel. I just looked it up, and there are “slim” cast iron pans, so maybe that’ll be a happy medium. Thanks for all the anecdotes and suggestions folks.
A seasoned cast-iron is the way, likely you’ve not used your correctly OP.
Needs proper pre-heating prior to cooking and needs to be properly seasoned before being employed.
OP said the problem is that they’re too heavy for Mrs. OP, not that they stick. I managed that problem for years by leaving mine on its designated burner 24/7. Until I got a glass top and had to stop using it.
What’s wrong with the glass top?
The otherwise magnificent 50-year-old 14" pan has such a downward-domed and knobbly bottom it only makes about 2 square inches of contact, so it not only won’t heat up, and wobbled, it was going to scratch/break the stovetop.
I have two pans like this and I love them soooo much, but they don’t fit my regular flat top OR induction burners… might be time to gift them to loved ones who have fire in their house still.
It used to settle into my old electric coils on the old stovetop just fine, but when it died mid-Covid I had to take what I could get.
Saaaame and saaaaame hahaha. I do prefer the flats and inducts to coils for sure, but I cannot use one of my favorite pans or my wok anymore. D:
Carbon steel
Yes, they complained about sticking.
Yeah, they are great. So much more durable than any coated pan.
And a healthy natural source of iron as opposed microplatsics & teflon.
Where will I get my teflon and microplastics then?
Oh, right. Everywhere.
a teflon pan won’t emit anything if you use soft tools like wood or silicone. it’s the manufacturing that puts out forever chemicals.
not that it matters, since we can’t really absorb molecules that long and it’s already literally everywhere.
I’m curious how you came to this conclusion. PFAS and PFOS stay in your body for an incredibly long time and can accumulate quickly. We have no easy way of processing them out, and yes we absorb them into our longer term cells like muscles and fat.
It’s an incredibly important health problem the world is facing, as every variant of PFAS and PFOS causes cancer. and there is no medical way to remove PFAS once its in your body. The absolute best you can do is lower (you can’t eliminate) your exposure over time and hope the build up isn’t enough to trigger cancer growth before you get cancer or die from another source of industrial pollution.
teflon itself isn’t a pfas afaik, but they’re used to produce it.
Teflon, or PTFE, is a type of PFAS, and is the most famous and most numerous contaminant in that family and the most likely contaminant to cause PFAS-related cancers in the developed world.
wouldn’t it need an alkyne group for that?
And if cast iron is too heavy, then use carbon steel or stainless. We just keep a Teflon pan to cook those frozen rotis.