Larry Caldwell
Super Member
Be prepared to buy a lot of flap wheels.
Seasoning a cast iron skillet....Tips please
- Thread starter General Lee
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Be prepared to buy a lot of flap wheels.
joshuabardwell
Elite Member
Can you elaborate? I can take off a heck of a lot of mild steel with a single flap wheel. Is cast iron that much harder?
Larry Caldwell
Super Member
Yes, cast iron is much harder than mild steel.
tcreeley
Elite Member
In our family we never used anything but cast iron for frying on the stove. I even have one large frying pan that we had as a kid. The pans go through the dish washer, brillo pads, steel wool pads. We cook in butter, sometimes olive oil or bacon fat. We cook on gas. Except when the pan is new- I never worry about seasoning, I just use it. Always have. -Great cooking surface. Nothing beats cast iron. Some pans have come from flea markets - cleaned them and used them.
SPIKER
Elite Member
next time you are Baking your Bacon stick your cast iron UNDER the bacon instead of the drip pan you talked about. Bacon and Lard (aka Crisco) are your BEST bets for seasoning followed up by Canola oil. Peanut oil will work but lots of people have allergies to that on top of the temps that peanut oil "cooks" at is a bit higher. we use most extensively 2 cast iron pans, and a stainless deep pan & skillets the SS for soups and acidic stuff while the cast for everything else including EGGs about the only things we ever have STICK are fried taters (we try to use as little oil as possible in them and just browning taters will burn to pan) and use olive oil in them for taste which is not very good seasoning oil for cast but good for cooking in.
The 12" deep skillet we do Old Style Southern Fried Chicken in it which makes it 100% non stick for weeks. we also have a 10" flat round skillet that we make garbage omelets in and only thing that might stick a bit would be some of the cheese.
Cleaning of the pans should be done regularly but not when hot, I ALWAYS let them cool as the oils and burnt or stuck on stuff seems to come off much easier. I also coat them well when hot with oil (bacon grease or canola) when cooling down if something dry was cooked in it. I scrape mine with the SS Spatula rounded edges and flexible so not a lot of pressure is subjected to the surfaces. I also wash mine regularly & use plastic scrubber with some dish soap (dawn) to remove the surface food bits and toss it onto the stove to dry it. I add some canola spray or a coat of bacon grease (after it is dry) and still heating and bring it up to a high heat for about a min & shut it off the grease/oil stays on until next cooking cycle.
One of the best pans I've had was made by "Imperial Ireland" & was originally a NON-STICK with a ceramic coating that had been chipped & tossed in garbage by my sister-n-law. I took it and sand blasted the ceramic that was chipped off and seasoned it. It was maybe 10" with a 10" wood handle with sloped sides instead of the flat sides like most US made ones. Eggs in it was like a non-stick commercial slide em around & right out onto a plate...
the people I sold my house to wanted to move some stuff in while I was moving stuff out. & the pan got left there & when I went back for it the young woman said she tossed it out as it was OLD & GREASY ... ug
Mark
The 12" deep skillet we do Old Style Southern Fried Chicken in it which makes it 100% non stick for weeks. we also have a 10" flat round skillet that we make garbage omelets in and only thing that might stick a bit would be some of the cheese.
Cleaning of the pans should be done regularly but not when hot, I ALWAYS let them cool as the oils and burnt or stuck on stuff seems to come off much easier. I also coat them well when hot with oil (bacon grease or canola) when cooling down if something dry was cooked in it. I scrape mine with the SS Spatula rounded edges and flexible so not a lot of pressure is subjected to the surfaces. I also wash mine regularly & use plastic scrubber with some dish soap (dawn) to remove the surface food bits and toss it onto the stove to dry it. I add some canola spray or a coat of bacon grease (after it is dry) and still heating and bring it up to a high heat for about a min & shut it off the grease/oil stays on until next cooking cycle.
One of the best pans I've had was made by "Imperial Ireland" & was originally a NON-STICK with a ceramic coating that had been chipped & tossed in garbage by my sister-n-law. I took it and sand blasted the ceramic that was chipped off and seasoned it. It was maybe 10" with a 10" wood handle with sloped sides instead of the flat sides like most US made ones. Eggs in it was like a non-stick commercial slide em around & right out onto a plate...
the people I sold my house to wanted to move some stuff in while I was moving stuff out. & the pan got left there & when I went back for it the young woman said she tossed it out as it was OLD & GREASY ... ugMark
OP
General Lee
Veteran Member
I'm gonna start keeping my eye out for some wagner and griswold pans/skillets.
creekbend
Super Star Member
In my part of the Country, they are available at local farm auctions, where one or both of the previous owners are deceased. Best wishes.
burnieman
Gold Member
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An old Cajun trick for seasoning a cast iron skillet is transmission fluid. We've used it for years in the swamp. Foods don't stick and cleanup is a breeze. My uncle toufee uses hydraulic fluid but I don't . Not sure how healthy that is.
joshuabardwell
Elite Member
I really disagree with this claim, no offense. I have put cast iron in the oven on the self-clean cycle, which tops out around 800 degrees or thereabouts. The pan comes out with absolutely no seasoning on it at all--totally bare metal that begins to rust almost instantly. IMO, there's no need to go higher than perhaps 500-600 degrees, and going too high will burn off the seasoning.
I watched a show with some stuff about Lodge Cast Iron on the History Channel the other night. After they cast the pan, they just have a robotic arm use a spray gun to coat it with "seasoning", then run it through some type of fancy heating system.
I'd wondered before how the Lodge Preseasoned cookware worked, but with that thin of a coating, I can see why they really wouldn't be seasoned. The pans were also suspended by the handle through the process, so it didn't look like the bottom of the pan would get nowhere near as seasoned as it would while laying flat.
I called my old mess sergeant about his method yesterday afternoon. He said that in order for something to be nonstick, it had to be flat, that little spikes and ridges in the casting was what the food was sticking to, they didn't have to be iron, that built up carbon would also do it, which is why he used the grill stone. Said it worked like a whet-rock to 'hone' those ridges and spikes down flat. He said he always thought that the salt worked because the oil stuck to the grains of salt and the stone forced both down into the casting.
I can't repeat every word he used because if I did, I'd be banned from this forum for life, but the gist of it was that anything cast would have food stick to it unless it was seasoned and his way had worked for him for 23 years and he sure as heck wasn't going to try or recommend any other way.
He also said that he loved his wife of 22 years more than anything, but she knew if she ever got caught using soap on one of his cast skillets that he'd slap her naked and steal her clothes!
I'd wondered before how the Lodge Preseasoned cookware worked, but with that thin of a coating, I can see why they really wouldn't be seasoned. The pans were also suspended by the handle through the process, so it didn't look like the bottom of the pan would get nowhere near as seasoned as it would while laying flat.
I called my old mess sergeant about his method yesterday afternoon. He said that in order for something to be nonstick, it had to be flat, that little spikes and ridges in the casting was what the food was sticking to, they didn't have to be iron, that built up carbon would also do it, which is why he used the grill stone. Said it worked like a whet-rock to 'hone' those ridges and spikes down flat. He said he always thought that the salt worked because the oil stuck to the grains of salt and the stone forced both down into the casting.
I can't repeat every word he used because if I did, I'd be banned from this forum for life, but the gist of it was that anything cast would have food stick to it unless it was seasoned and his way had worked for him for 23 years and he sure as heck wasn't going to try or recommend any other way.
He also said that he loved his wife of 22 years more than anything, but she knew if she ever got caught using soap on one of his cast skillets that he'd slap her naked and steal her clothes!
aczlan
Good Morning
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Just made eggs in one of our cast iron skillets. Cleanup consisted of putting a little warm water into the pan right after I took the eggs out, scrubbing the egg remnants out, rinsing, then setting back on the burner to dry off after which it got some oil rubbed in.
Aaron Z
Aaron Z
dave1949
Super Star Member
I'm not having all the problems some have mentioned with Lodge pre-seasoned pans. Actually, I think the little surface bumps allow cooking oil reservoirs to exist under the food. I also think the bumps and their texture are there by design, not just because the pan wasn't ground smooth after casting. I agree that cooking temperature has a lot to do with food not sticking.
With old pans with a heavy "seasoning" layer, you aren't cooking on cast iron, you are cooking on a built-up layer food and oil residues--not that there is anything wrong with that--as anyone with a favorite potato frying pan knows.
With old pans with a heavy "seasoning" layer, you aren't cooking on cast iron, you are cooking on a built-up layer food and oil residues--not that there is anything wrong with that--as anyone with a favorite potato frying pan knows.
RoyJackson
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Yes, they are sand castings...that's how Lodge orders them from the foundry.
dmccarty
Super Star Member
Sitting here with a throbbing finger....
I will be making a pot of field peas today and whole grain bread to go with on Sunday. I should have started the dough yesterday but I did not think about it early enough. I needed to clean up the cast iron bread pans and I ended up having to soak them in water to get off the bread that had stuck to the pans. I put the pans back in the oven and blasted them for four minutes with the toaster setting which I think gets over 400 degrees. I let the pans sit in the hot oven and then went to add some oil and try to the salt rub.
I grabbed a towel to pick up the pans but I did not fold it over like I normally would and SHOULD. The pans had been in the oven for 15-30 minutes and my brain obviously was not working...
Hard to believe but the cast iron was still hot! :duh::muttering::hissyfit::irked:
:laughing::laughing::laughing:
My dad uses salt to clean up the pans and Gunny's testimonial made me try. Just wished I had folded up the towel a few more times. :shocked:
Ice water does help. :laughing::laughing::laughing:
Later,
Dan
I will be making a pot of field peas today and whole grain bread to go with on Sunday. I should have started the dough yesterday but I did not think about it early enough. I needed to clean up the cast iron bread pans and I ended up having to soak them in water to get off the bread that had stuck to the pans. I put the pans back in the oven and blasted them for four minutes with the toaster setting which I think gets over 400 degrees. I let the pans sit in the hot oven and then went to add some oil and try to the salt rub.
I grabbed a towel to pick up the pans but I did not fold it over like I normally would and SHOULD. The pans had been in the oven for 15-30 minutes and my brain obviously was not working...
Hard to believe but the cast iron was still hot! :duh:
:muttering::hissyfit::irked::laughing::laughing::laughing:
My dad uses salt to clean up the pans and Gunny's testimonial made me try. Just wished I had folded up the towel a few more times. :shocked:
Ice water does help. :laughing::laughing::laughing:
Later,
Dan
DaveOmak
Platinum Member
General Lee, Morning..... the best oil to use to season Cast Iron is an oil that has a high iodine number... Flax seed oil fits that the best.... It has a low smoke point and should not be used for frying.... Put a thin layer on the pan and heat to 400-450 deg F.... It will smoke... the oil polymerizes into a very, very hard coating.... I have a new #10 DO with about 6 coatings on it... Nothing sticks to it now.... beans and hocks rinse right out... spaghetti sauce, tomato base will rinse right out.... It may need an additional coating and baking but the coating is still there... Flax Oil can be found on Amazon or your local health food store.... It is worth the price.... After coating CI for years with other oils that don't really work, I am very happy with the Flax Oil coating.... Dave
NY_Yankees_Fan
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Good stuff here on flax oil Chemistry of Cast Iron Seasoning: A Science-Based How-To
Just purchased a waffle iron from Amazon, see link its being shipped and on its way .
Amazon.com: Rome's #1100 Old Fashioned Waffle Iron, Cast Iron: Home & Kitchen
AchingBack
Elite Member
While out, and about in search for cast iron, a 13" Griswold skillet would be a very valuable find. Even a lid is going for close to $3,000. Griswold #13 Skillet Lid #473 Low Dome "EXTREMELY RARE"
TomSeller
Super Member
If you have old cast iron that looks to be in good condition but has years of caked on crud and you want to clean it down to bare metal the best way I have heard of is electrolysis. I have not tried this yet as I didn't come across the process until I had used the oven's self cleaning cycle on mine.
http://www.wag-society.org/Electrolysis/electros.php
If you use the oven you will end up with bare grey metal that is rusty as mentioned by others. I then wire brush or wire wheel as much rust off as I can. Once I have the pan clean I use vinegar water 50% solution similar to the following
http://www.hobbyfarms.com/crafts-and-nature/cast-iron-refurbish.aspx
I add a step where I neutralize the pan after the acidic vinegar treatment in baking soda water ( a base) before oiling and seasoning in the oven.
http://www.wag-society.org/Electrolysis/electros.php
If you use the oven you will end up with bare grey metal that is rusty as mentioned by others. I then wire brush or wire wheel as much rust off as I can. Once I have the pan clean I use vinegar water 50% solution similar to the following
http://www.hobbyfarms.com/crafts-and-nature/cast-iron-refurbish.aspx
I add a step where I neutralize the pan after the acidic vinegar treatment in baking soda water ( a base) before oiling and seasoning in the oven.
