Seasoning a cast iron skillet....Tips please

[General Lee]

Nothing I'm doing seems to be working very well. I have a few cast iron pieces but mainly use the skillet and recently have been trying to use it exclusively when a skillet is called for.

Its the "Lodge" pre-seasoned brand and I am aware it is not considered as good as "Griswold" or "Wagner". I also took the "pre-season" with a grain of salt. Its has not seen dish soap since I've had it. Hot water cleaning with a brush only. It is wiped down with oil after each use. Recently I also did the seasoning procedure in the oven like all instructions call for (did it twice) but things are still sticking. Sometimes it seems I'm making progress with it then it seems I get to much stuff stuck on the bottom and aggressive scraping while cleaning takes away and seasoned progress I've made.

I know some folks on here know how cast iron cooking is done, please share some tips

 

[creekbend]

There have been several threads in the past regarding this issue. I use cast iron for most everything I cook. I received a set of 8 pieces of cast iron with lids over 40 years ago for a wedding present from my Aunt. The cast iron was 80 years old when I received them. All I ever do with them is season them with Crisco - the kind in a can - in the oven at 350 degrees. Once they are seasoned over the years, there is hardly any need for any other seasoning. Some people use old bacon grease. I don't use brushes when cleaning the pieces, only a sponge with hot water at times. Usually only a paper towel. Some will suggest olive oil, but do a little research on its use. Best wishes. BTW, after 120 years, there is not one Pit on any of the pieces. Best wishes. Research Cast iron cooking here on TBN. You might find some of the old threads. Best wishes.

 

[FritzWH]

This will be heresy to some, but I agree with most of the info here:
How To: Cast Iron Skillet Non-Stick and Lasts a Lifetime

 

[AchingBack]

What are you cooking in your skillet? Acidic foods, especially tomatoes will instantly remove the seasoning. Don't use real high temperatures, and don't use soap, or detergent for cleaning. Cast iron works best at a moderate heat level. Too high of a heat causes the seasoning to be cooked out. After cooking, allow your pan to cool, and lightly scrape any burned on food. Rinse with cool water, and allow to dry.

Occasionally I fry some sausage or other meats with high fat content. This helps to keep the pan seasoned, as well. Remember, acids, and soaps are the enemies of cast iron. Also, cooking with cast iron contributes to your MDR of iron.

 

[General Lee]

I don't use brushes when cleaning the pieces, only a sponge with hot water at times. Usually only a paper towel.

I wouldn't use a brush if I didn't have too. Dang food is sticking, lol.

 

[General Lee]

What are you cooking in your skillet? Acidic foods, especially tomatoes will instantly remove the seasoning. Don't use real high temperatures, and don't use soap, or detergent for cleaning. Cast iron works best at a moderate heat level. Too high of a heat causes the seasoning to be cooked out. After cooking, allow your pan to cool, and lightly scrape any burned on food. Rinse with cool water, and allow to dry.

Occasionally I fry some sausage or other meats with high fat content. This helps to keep the pan seasoned, as well. Remember, acids, and soaps are the enemies of cast iron. Also, cooking with cast iron contributes to your MDR of iron.

No tomatoes or soap have been in the skillet. I have noticed an improvement when I cook at lower temps, so you are right on with that tip. I think a big problem is the "Lodge" brand. The bottom of the skillet (inside) is kinda rough and it takes more seasoning to fill the voids. I read of the issue in other reviews.

Oh, mainly I'm cooking meats and breakfast foods in the skillet. Eggs, bacon, sausage, chicken , pork etc. Eggs are the toughest

 

[joshuabardwell]

Everyone has different opinions about cast iron, some of them wildly conflicting. Here's mine.

First thing, is that I have never had a cast iron pan be as non-stick as Teflon, no matter what the old ladies at the sewing circle say. I always need some oil to cook on the pan. If I cook fried potatoes, for example, there is always some brown bits stuck to the bottom of the pan. If the pan is well seasoned, the brown bits will come off easily. But they're always there. Maybe I'm just doing it wrong, but I've been cooking with cast iron for, say, about ten years now, and I've tried near everything.

Initial seasoning: my belief is that the initial seasoning requires carbonization of the fat, which requires that the fat be brought to its smoke temperature. Therefore, I do initial seasoning by putting the pan in a grill until it is about 500-600 degrees, coating it with a light coating of oil, shortening, or lard, then letting it smoke until it's done smoking. Repeat as many times as you care to. I have an infrared thermometer, which is what I use to get the pan's temperature. If I didn't have one of those, I would coat the pan in fat and raise the heat until it just began to smoke. If you do this indoors in the oven, the smoke will be a bit much, so outside on the grill is really the right way to do it.

Bear in mind that if the pan gets too hot, (say, 800-900 degrees), all of the seasoning will burn off and you'll be left worse than you started. This is a good method of "resetting" a pan that has become unrecoverable through other means, but it's not what you're going for when doing initial seasoning.

Once the pan has its initial seasoning, the normal cooking process will begin to wear it off. I try to season my pans "naturally"--in other words, I try to cook up a mess of sausage or bacon or other fatty food regularly.

I try to clean my pans in such a way that it preserves the seasoning. If I can, I simply wipe out the pan and wipe it down with a light coat of fat. If I need to scrape off stuck-on stuff, I use a wooden spatula. For scouring, I use kosher salt and a sacrifical washcloth (it will be very greasy/dirty at the end) or paper towels. I never, ever use soap. If the pan needs to be rinsed, I try to rinse it using cold water, to leave as much of the fatty coating behind as possible.

If the pan has stuck on food and can't be cleaned any other way (e.g. somebody made a bunch of scrambled eggs and didn't use enough butter), my "secret" way of cleaning the pan is to get some old bacon grease (but fresh oil would do) and heat it up in the pan. Once the pan gets hot and greasy, whatever is stuck to it will usually cook right off. A little scraping with the wooden spatula may be required. This allows cleaning even the worst messes out of the pan without ever having to use soap, aggressive scrubbing, or other things that would hurt the seasoning.

I have three cast iron pans, and without question, the more I use them, the better their seasoning is. So the best advice would be to use your pan regularly, cook fatty food every now and then, clean in such a way as to preserve the seasoning, and don't expect space-age (Teflon) results from iron-age technology.

 

[TomSeller]

What are you cooking in it? I have mostly Griswold from the early 1900s and a few Wagners from the same era. I have a few items from the 1800s but the best is the Griswold from the early 1900s. I consider the skillets to be "light stick" with meats and "non stick" with eggs, veggies, etc. Pancakes can stick a little as well. Anything acidic need to be cooked in stainless, since it will remove the seasoning real quick on cast iron. I use a flat spatula and plastic scrubber pad to get back down to the pan after every use. I don't use soap but lightly heat sanitize after every use. Then apply coconut oil while still warm (turns to solid at room temp). Coconut oil is antibacterial, anti fungal and antiviral. Since the pans sit at room temp with oil on them you should consider it. I use my cast iron daily and have nearly every size pan there is. Including skillets, dutch ovens, servers, griddles, the whole 9 yards. I am kind of old school when it comes to cooking.

Seasoning in the oven is a must, two maybe even three or four times. Then use the snot out of it. It should be black, not brown when it is seasoned.

 

[General Lee]

Good post Joshua, appreciate the info.

 

[General Lee]

What are you cooking in it?

I'm cooking meats and breakfast foods in the skillet. Eggs, bacon, sausage, chicken , pork etc. Eggs are the toughest

 

[TomSeller]

No tomatoes or soap have been in the skillet. I have noticed an improvement when I cook at lower temps, so you are right on with that tip. I think a big problem is the "Lodge" brand. The bottom of the skillet (inside) is kinda rough and it takes more seasoning to fill the voids. I read of the issue in other reviews.

Oh, mainly I'm cooking meats and breakfast foods in the skillet. Eggs, bacon, sausage, chicken , pork etc. Eggs are the toughest

Eggs slide off mine like you wouldn't believe. The Griswold is smooth, smooth. I never have used Lodge. Pork and chicken do stick a little the way I use mine. But like I said, I take mine down to smooth metal every time. Some people let a little buildup occur, I don't. I never cook past half way on the temp setting on my induction cooktop.

 

[wedge40]

Getting cast iron to an "almost" non-stick state can take some time and patients. If the bottom and sides still have that rough look it's not seasoned enough. I use high heat oil in mine (peanut, canola etc) placed in a 300* oven for at least 30 minutes. Let it cool, take it out, wipe it down and repeat a couple of times. When doing eggs I still use some non-stick spray. I never fry bacon, I always bake my bacon.
After each use of the pan I clean it with hot water, place back on the stove on a high heat burner and wait till it just starts to smoke again, then turn the heat off. They get touched up with oil every now and again when I see spots that are getting bare. If there are things stuck to the pan use plastic or something non metal to scrape it off. I treat cast iron like teflon and try not to use to may steel utensils with it.

Is this the correct way to deal with cast iron cook ware. I dont know, but it seems to work for me.

Wedge

 

[schmism]

I belive lodge brand are rough sand cast and not finished. The older castiron was ground to a finish on the inside to leave it much smoother.

Lodge can be significantly improved if you take a flap disk sanding wheel (4.5" grinder) to it and smooth out all those sand cast bumps.

Then season well in the oven.

Ive heard you can really bake in a lot of grease if you deep fry chicken in them the way gran used to.

 

[Gunny]

I've still got one of the old high sided chicken fryers that belonged to my Mom and it does one heck of a job frying chicken, that's the only thing I allow to be cooked in it. I treat that thing like it was made of gold!

I've also got 3 wagners and 2 griswolds that get used pretty regularly, no soap to clean, warm water, salt and a paper towel is all the need, but I re-season them every spring.
You'll find that there are many different opinions on how to season cast iron, but this one has always worked for me:

I had an old mess Sergeant tell me that when he seasoned his cast iron grills in the Army, he always used lard. He'd heat the grill up and smear on a good coating of lard, liberally sprinkle salt over it, then start rubbing the salt and lard into the cast iron with a grill stone, or cleaning block. He swore that there was something about the salt that helped push the lard into the cast iron. Then when it cooled down, rinse with water and heat until dry. That old fellow has made me a million egg sandwiches out in the field on his cast grills and I never saw an egg even think about sticking!

I do the seasoning outside in the spring on my gas fish cooker unit. I always wear welding gloves because working that grill stone around, it's easy to get burned, but an hour or so of work once a year does the job.

 

[Baby Grand]

The Plant Manager has amassed an impressive collection of pans & skillets from eBay, Goodwill, tag sales, etc. Schism is right about the surface finish on the Lodge brand - they appear to be as-cast from a sand casting process, whereas the Griswold and Wagners are mostly machined or ground to a fine finish. I have been very disapointed with the Lodge cast performance and will try the flap wheel on them to see if i can bring them up a notch.

I use mostly lard collected from baking bacon on a wire grill on top of a low sided sheet in the oven. This provides a much better release than butter and won't burn until a higher temperature.

I'm really interested in trying the salt in the lard, like Gunny mentions. Now I need to research that grill stone some as I've never used one.

Another thing to consider is the spatula you use. We have an old Ecko that's got a thick, springy blade with gently rounded corners and edges that doesn't scrape the seasoned cast iron, even if you use it briskly.

 

[JamesHW]

I use a lodge for eggs all the time with no problem (and a little butter as well). We just season it by putting on a little over medium heat and wipe a bit of canola oil on it until it smokes a bit. repeat this a bunch of times. I will usually do this a few times when prepping the ingredients I am cooking such as asian style stir frys, fried rice, or letting a steak rest a bit prior to pan searing it. If something gets stuck even after rinseing and a light scrub with a brush (like potatoes as mentioned) I simply return it to the heat and add some oil and kosher salt and use the salt to sand away the stuck bits of food with a wadded paper towel pushed around with a wooden paddle. This seems to clean the non-stick surface that has built up without removing it.

Up at our country place all the cast iron is over 100 years old (a mix of Griswold and no name pans) and doesn't need anything to improve the non-stick performance. I've considered sanding the Lodge pans smooth. I have a larger pan that the non-stick surface got damaged (spouses training has not been completed) which I haven't gotten around to renewing and I will likely try smoothing that one out prior to seasoning.

 

[mjarrels]

Go to a old yard sale, old auction and buy some from estates. All ready well seasoned and pennies on the dollar. Great weapons until their outlawed.

mark

 

[dmccarty]

When I use our cast iron, I clean it up usually with just a paper towel, but water if needed. Usually the oven or stove is still hot so I will throw a bit of Canola oil on the cast iron and put it back on the stove top or in the oven to heat back up. This works for me. I cook eggs in a stainless steel skillet not cast iron. If I use plenty of butter, the eggs don't stick at all.

I just bought some Lodge cast iron bread pans and the bread stuck in a few places even though the pans were pre seasoned and I did my own seasoning. It is going to be a PITA to clean up those pans so I might try the hot oil trick and see what happens. The pans will work fine once they are seasoned enough.

Later,
Dan

 

[Larry Caldwell]

I belive lodge brand are rough sand cast and not finished. The older castiron was ground to a finish on the inside to leave it much smoother.

Lodge can be significantly improved if you take a flap disk sanding wheel (4.5" grinder) to it and smooth out all those sand cast bumps.

Then season well in the oven.

Ive heard you can really bake in a lot of grease if you deep fry chicken in them the way gran used to.

Exactly. Quality cast iron is smooth as glass, even before it is seasoned. Once it is seasoned, it is as close to perfect cookware as it's possible to get. Sand cast cookware can be brought up to quality, but it's a lot of work. Use corundum sandpaper, a small pad sander, and be prepared to work on it for hours. It may take several days on and off to buff it down to a smooth condition.

The best way I have found to season cast iron is to make popcorn in it.

 

[joshuabardwell]

Use corundum sandpaper, a small pad sander, and be prepared to work on it for hours. It may take several days on and off to buff it down to a smooth condition.

This may be dumb, but why not a flap wheel on an angle grinder?