1968

Hell, I even have an “egg pan” I guess I never thought of it that way, but it is a small teflon pan I literally only ever use for cooking 1-2 eggs. I am a gadget freak and own way too many pans, but I think every kitchen should have at least 1 teflon pan for real sticky recipes/foods.

1969

Mainly because I keep my cast iron on the stove so it’s always first choice, and it’s big enough I can cook a sausage patty, toast some bread, and then finish with an egg while cheese melts onto the bread. I do have a small Teflon I use often, and I keep it pristine with a plastic spatula and wooden spoons, but I like the way the egg cooks with the stored heat in the iron vs. the more direct heat of the Teflon.

All the previous posts were more about how an egg is a great test of a cast iron, rather than it being the ultimate tool for the job.

1970

Best way to cook an egg is to shallow-fry it like the Thai do, shoulders-deep in hot oil in a wok, so the whole thing gets brown and crispy with filigreed edges.

Not super healthy, though.

image
image746×570 47.7 KB

1971

Eggs are very good.

1972

I’m suspicious of the chemicals used in nonstick cookware, but I understand not everyone is.

1973

It kills birds. I know this from sad experience. There are none in my house.

1974

To each their own! :)
To me those eggs look like they’ve been murdered!

1975

Those chemicals are known harmful, so I’d rather not have them at all. The risk of scratching a pan, getting the coating into the food, and having to repeatedly throw away and buy more pans is just not worth it (for me).

1976

Coating getting into the food is not unsafe, it will pass through you.

1977

Yeah, Teflon is safe for consumption.

The bigger issue is that no non stick pan, even the fancy hex clad ones, will last forever. The coating will always eventually scratch and come off. They will never be an heirloom item, like a steel pan or good knife.

But if you are willing to accept their lack of permanence, which can be extended if you treat them well, they can do things that other pans can’t.

1978

Isn’t the real risk with Teflon letting the pan get too hot? That’s how you get the toxic fumes.

1979

Correct, it is misusing teflon. Or using ancient pans that were using materials that are no longer allowed to be used.

1980

Huh. I didn’t realize you could theoretically eat the stuff, so do appreciate the corrections. But I still don’t want to eat it or worry about overheating etc 🙄

1981

Sure, fair enough concern.

I have 1 teflon pan I have in rotation, it is my fish and eggs cooking pan. I also have this sticky bbq chicken thighs recipe I use it for as well, because that sauce is really quick to burn/stick.

Teflon also allows you to use less cooking oil, if you are concerned about that.

Non-stick pans were all the rage in the 90’s, I think my first set of pans had a lot of variously sized non-stick pots/pans. You shouldn’t be using a non-stick pan for all recipes, I think they are really great for a few specific applications, but definitely shouldn’t be your go-to pan. There has been a big shift in the home-cooking space away from the non-stick pan craze, back to using proper steel/aluminum pans for most jobs.

One of my absolute favorite pans is a lodge cast-iron ceramic coated dutch oven. I love using that for soups, curries, etc. It holds heat so well, provides a great browning surface, and can be tossed in/out of the oven.

1982

Yeah. I’ve got 8" and 10" nonstick skillets – use the former almost exclusively for eggs, the latter frequently for fish since my partner likes that a lot, or when I make a bigger omelet. There’s a 12" nonstick, but tbh, I haven’t touched it in months. For these purposes, though, they are perfect. There’s also a small 1qt nonstick saucepan that I slightly prefer for stuff like oatmeal and grits, since I like both on the thicker, long-cooked side of things, and scraping the excess bits off of my stainless steel pots sucks butts. The skillets are nice All-Clad induction-compatible models, and the last set lasted about 4 years of not-very-good care; the new set are about a year old and still looking great now that I’m being more mindful about them.

Got my sizable 12" Lodge cast iron, which is great for everything from hash browns to burgers to searing off chicken or steak, and big enough that I can do a few different things at once if need be, but it’s so fuckin’ heavy and large that any kind of moving or cleaning it is just an absolute hassle.

Then a set of stainless steel saucepans (1, 1.5, and 2.5qt, I think) that handle a lot of rice-making and sometimes small servings of beans (like reheating canned) or red sauce, a high-walled stainless steel skillet that I admittedly almost never use (the cast iron does almost all the same things just about as well), and a couple of big stainless dutch ovens that I use constantly for everything from curry to red beans to chili.

Like Jon, I’ve got a ceramic+cast iron Lodge dutch oven, but like the skillet, it’s just absurdly heavy (and, to be fair, I am a weak milkbaby soyboy) and thus an utter bear to clean out, so I virtually never use it unless I’m making three big-pot-requiring things at once (very common at holidays or when cooking for a crowd) and just need the extra vessel.

Technically there’s also an 8" carbon steel long-handled pan, but I fucked up the initial seasoning and it got rusty in several spots and just really hideous and unevenly colored, and I never felt like bothering to fix it just for the sake of “a lil egg pan that’s just worse than my nonstick, albeit more durable.”

Our wok’s nonstick, too – a great huge Joyce Chen number – but since I don’t have gas, it doesn’t really do much more than a big skillet for most purposes; I just kinda like how it looks :)

1983

I find my carbon steel pan is great as a sous vide finisher, when I don’t need the full on sear of the cast iron but want a bit of maillard.

1984

I did a bunch of research the last time I bought non-stick stuff because I didn’t want it to fail quickly over time and eventually settled on the Kitchen-Aid hard anodized stuff. Up to that point I had only used Calphalon pans. I’ve been really happy with the set and other than a nick in the large skillet that I think one of my kids did, they’re still 100% perfect.

They’re no longer available, but here’s the links…

1985

My non-stick go to pan is a calphalon, and it has been bulletproof since we recieved it 5 years ago as a wedding present.

1986

They’re really good, but they were slipping a little when I got these in 2016 and the recommendation was the ones up above.

1987

My one non-stick pan is a Blue Diamond. Ceramic coating. Works just fine.