Ask Lemmy

Cast iron sears better for sure.

I use decent stainless steel for everything else. Non-stick scares me.

Just about everything is better than non-stick pans. Like others pointed out the non-stick chemicals will eventually flake off into your food so you're eating that stuff. And non-stick pans sort of have an expiration date, they will eventually lose all their non-stick abilities at which point you'll wonder what's the point of using it anymore.

Beyond that the other stuff is maybe more personal preference. Stainless steel is great keeping in mind you'll always have to oil it and always have to clean it well. On the other hand cast-iron is essentially always oiled and ready to go so you typically don't worry about that part of the cooking.

re: your other question I was forced to use something electric at my current home and ended up getting an induction stove after a lifetime of using gas stoves. I love the induction stove so much I'm not sure I'd want to go back to something else. It heats up so fast that I had to re-learn some of my cooking since the pan always reaches the desired temperature in a few seconds. Induction stoves are also safer, there are no open flames and no gas fumes hanging around.

I've been enjoying my carbon steel more than cast iron. It's the same as cast iron for seasoning and non stick, but much lighter.

I don't like non-stick anymore because the coating eventually gets all scratched up and doesn't work as good. Idk how it gets scratched up, I never used metal. My ex did, so maybe it was her.

Cast Iron, if maintained well (i.e just don't cook anything too acidic. You don't usually need to re-season), lasts forever. It's also great for when you want to sear something without the pan cooling down once you put your food on it. Because it's thick and stores a bunch of heat. Yet somehow it also gets hot pretty fast.

I don't get stainless steel personally. Apparently to get things to not stick, I should be using MORE heat? But I already use a lot of heat! On the up side, they get hot really fast.

Copper and carbon steel I've never used. I hear carbon steel is similar to cast iron in many ways, but easier to maintain?

If you're doing a new build, definitely go induction. Electric sucks because it's kinda slow-ish to get started, gas sucks because either you need to have a gas line built to your house if you don't already have one, or you change out the gas container every now and then (and that thing is heavy, mine's 17 KG of gas + whatever the huge chunk of metal weighs, which is definitely more than 17 KG). Plus the whole issue of, y'know, freshly burnt hydrocarbons (yay CO2 and potentially other gases). Oh and gas explosions aren't common, but they can happen!

Only downside of induction is that if you lose power, you can't cook. A wood-burning stove as a backup is excellent in this case, because depending on what your heating system is, you may also lose heating if power is gone.

Cast iron is nice because it's lower conduction rate means you can get a lot more radiant heat without burning whatever's on it. (Also I guess the "seasoning" adds flavor but eh.)

All day every day I vastly prefer cooking with stainless. It's infinitely tougher than any coating can be, sheds no flavor to the food when cooking with acids, you can scrub the shit out of it, and it doesn't warp like aluminum.

We were told that the teflon coating is "inert", implying it's harmless. But, now we have microplastics in every cell in our body, of which, teflon is one. I'm not sure that chemically inert equals harmless.

Cast iron is great once you learn to cook with it. Food does stick sometimes, even in a "seasoned" pan. But, it's not a big deal. Also, you can clean and polish it with power tools, if you need to. It's virtually indestructible.

Induction stoves? You WILL break the glass, and the glass is expensive to replace. If I got electric, I'd go with an old-school coiled heating element type, literally buy an old, used stove, because new appliances are crap construction quality. You can get them refurbished, and they're easy to fix if anything goes wrong--very simple machines.

If you choose gas, you NEED good ventilation, a hood that vents to the outside. At least, you need to open a window while you're burning the gas.

I use cast iron on electric and am 100% happy with both. I have a mix of pans that I bought new and acquired used. One of them was quite rough and I restored it. I find them extremely easy to use and cleanup.

Cast iron is great if you use it a lot. It does take a little more work to maintain because after you clean it it's best if you dry it and coat it with a thin layer of oil, but you don't have to if you use it all the time. Mine is non stick enough to fry an egg with no oil, so it's better than my old ass Teflon pans in that sense, but probably not as good as a new Teflon pan

Get a thick bottom stainless steel pan and don’t be afraid to use butter, it’ll take care of all your needs and doesn’t require special or gentle treatment.

Some answers here are close.

It depends on what type of person you are.

If you're the kind of person who has a neat, clean kitchen who does all their dishes after every meal, go cast iron.

If you're the kind of person who has a messy kitchen and you really only do dishes once or twice a week, go primarily with stainless, a nonstick pan for eggs, and a 10-12 inch cast iron pan for occasional use, like that rib roast.

The cast-iron I've been using for the past 16 years was probably made in the 1940's in Ontario and will likely still be around after I die, unless someone leaves it in the rain or something. With coated pans I'd have to buy new ones every four years or so (which is not only costly but environmentally unfriendly)... not to mention the health risks of using non-stick, which are negligible IF you never forget it on a hot burner; it will overheat and the coating will break down and leach into your food.

Gas ranges also release toxins into the air which can only be properly extracted if you cook under a fume hood, like one you might find in a chemistry lab... even the best kitchen exhaust fans can't exchange the air that well and you're left breathing in carcinogens everyday when you cook your meals. So, if one uses a coated pan on a gas stove... well.

IMO the best choices are anything except coated pans on an induction stove. I read somewhere induction stoves are more efficient but I've never actually looked into it. Cast irons can certainly be a pain in the ass to maintain, but once you get a good coating on there it's smooth cooking until something acidic is cooked with it, or a roommate puts it in the dishwasher for you... which is why it's good to also have a steel pan also. I've never eve heard of copper pans lol, sounds expensive.

Different tools for different jobs. There's a ton more variables at play. Oversimplifying does just that.

Play with it all. Try to do both. Then you will have a better idea. Or post on lemmy asking everybody and read a lot of incomplete and possibly misleading explanations that might help you find the detail(s) you lack to edge your mind into a wider hunger for deeper understanding.

Mine? Cast iron is just different. Like using a truck vs using a car.

In real life, nothing is clear. So, when people give you clear explanations, they may be making the decision to not invest a lot of energy trying to get you to understand or know more. Like right now, I know that spectrum people take a lot of explaining sometimes, and I am really tired and going to bed, so my best advice is to understand they're different. Learn by doing if you can, and learn from others if you can. But, if it means anything, I use two cast iron skillets, three types of stainless steel pans, some of them tri-ply, and an aluminum with a nonstick coating. I have my preferences not just for different things, but styles of certain things, and even times for different things (like just cooking for me, or one other person, or multiple other people).

Also, generally with non-stick, using high heat or metal utensils on it will ruin it and expose you to pretty bad chemicals basically immediately. But also so does any smoke in general.

Literally pick your poison.

For gas vs. electric vs. induction vs. infrared:

I've never cooked on gas so I can't speak to it. I always had normal electric ranges.

Then I got an induction stovetop and it was a game changer. Instead of using a heating element to heat the pot, it uses magnets to agitate the atoms in the cookware and that turns the pot into a heater.

For example, I can boil a pot of water in 2 minutes, faster than a microwave.

The downside is you HAVE to use magnetic pans for it to work (like cast iron.) If you have, say, an aluminum pan, you have to get a stainless steel plate, which will heat the pan and the pan heats the food, just like a normal electric stove.

Infrared works the same way as electric, it heats the pot which heats the food.

My family uses our cast iron skillets daily. We have one that is almost exclusively for eggs, and one for meat.

Cast iron wants to be used often and if you really like cooking, will eventually become your go-to. But not everyone gets there; for a lot of people it is counterintuitive to have a pan that you only scrub any bits off and rinse with plain water. Actually, our egg pan only gets wiped out with paper towels because its so slippery now. I don't think I've scrubbed it in months.

If you really want to use your pans:

1. Best: cast iron
2. Better: stainless steel or enameled
3. Good: high quality nonstick like HexClad
4. Never: cheap non-stick

We use the absolute hell out of our cast iron and our stainless steel. They all get scrubbed with a metal Chore-Boy scrubbee. Only the stainless gets soap.

Induction FTW and cast iron does work the best with induction since it heats up the most. However, I also enjoy non-stick since it being slower is an OK trade-off for the easy cleanup

I can’t comment on the various toxicities…but I was a high-end chef for 20 years. Stainless (proper stainless, with a high quality underside) and cast iron pans were essential for their respective purposes. Non-stick pans generally weren’t used outside of breakfast in kitchens without a flattop. Copper was a gimmick for homeowners…never saw one in a kitchen. My understanding was the copper was on the outside and the shtick was it was supposed to regulate heat better…BS AFAIK…it just made them look slick and therefore easier to sell.

Stainless are the go-to for searing and sautées…nothing is going to stick if you know what you’re doing and monitor the pan. Cast iron was for things you started on the stovetop and moved to the oven to finish…and/or for things you blacken or crust. In my experience the same effect can be achieved with a stainless pan (never buy a pan with a plastic handle that can’t go in the oven and always cook with a hot-cloth)…but some chefs swear by cast iron for niche purposes and they’re certainly easier to clean and last longer, even if they’re useless for sauteeing (square shape).

Oh…woks can compliment stainless pans for sauteeing if you have people who know what they’re doing with them…you pretty much can’t leave a wok unattended…but they get the best results for what they’re made for (stir fry, fried rice, etc).

Gas is the only choice for proper heat regulation. All the other elements are out of the question for proper cooking.

As someone who learned way more about pans than I really want to know, let me say that a good cook can make good food in any pan, however some pans are more suited to tasks than others.

First off, searing meat in a non-stick pan (traditionally Teflon) is a bad idea, the pan can reach temperatures that produce toxic gases, and are known to kill birds that are more sensitive to them than we are. The coating that makes them nonstick isn't very durable and will at most last a few years before being useless. While other kinds of pans are likely to outlive you.

Other common pans include cast iron, stainless steel, carbon steel, and ceramic non-stick (non-toxic, but are delicate)

Specifically for searing meets, my favorite is stainless steel. It holds heat similar to cast iron, but is slightly more conductive and can transfer a lot of heat to sear meat. Meat also literally bonds to pan and can be used to make great flavorful sauces with deglazing. Cleanup is easy, if anything is really stuck just boil water in it to loosen. Alternatively stainless steel holds up decent in a dishwasher. Cleanup can't be easier than automatic. However, stainless steel is still quite heavy.

For general purpose cooking my personal favorite is carbon steel. It's seasoned like cast iron and can be quite nonstick, but is much lighter making it feel very similar to nonstick pans, which are made with aluminum.
I won't lie, seasoning has a learning curve. Seasoning is very tough under some circumstances, and very delicate under others. Notably acid will eat the seasoning away.

Cast iron is great, but it is so heavy that it is inconvenient to use.

All will work with induction, except for cheap aluminum nonstick pans

Consumer reports does a non-stick pan test where they fry an egg without oil repeatedly until it starts to stick. The point is that normal use degrades non stick surfaces, so every non-stick pan, no matter how fancy, will one day be garbage.

Don't get me wrong, I use both non-stick and metal surface pans. I think they both have their place, but I think of non-stick pans as expendable.

Sometimes it's not about metal hot. It's about how fast or slowly metal gets hot.

A lot of pans are made of stamped sheet metal and quite thin. They get hot very fast, they cool down very fast. With something like a gas burner, you can get a ring of very hot metal where the flames are, and relatively cool metal everywhere else.

Cast iron is thicker, and has a lot more thermal mass. It heats up slower, it evens that heat out, and it hangs onto that heat.

If you were to try to bake cornmeal in a sheet steel pan, it would burn. The metal would get too hot too fast. I prefer cast iron for making rues as well, because you get much more even heat.

Sometimes you do want a lighter pan for concentrated high-heat applications. Woks are designed for cooking over a very hot, very concentrated flame so there's one very hot spot in the pan, perfect for stir frying.

If you know what you're doing, you can cook non-stick in a stainless pan, it just takes some oil. Famously, cast iron pans can be "seasoned" or coated with a thin layer of extremely smooth polymerized oil which forms a non-stick surface, like DIY teflon.

So, honestly, I would recommend having a couple of each and choose the pan for the kind of cooking you're doing.

Pan make food hot. But cold food make flimsy lightweight pan less hot too. Food just sort of simmers while sometimes you want scorching.

Cast iron, or heavy bottom stainless steel pan, stays hot while food touches the pan. More energy is stored in hot heavy bottom pan. Food gets scorched and this gives more roasty toasty flavour, which is better in my opinion. If you don't care for this, don't.

Also, heavy bottoms spread heat more evenly so everything is cooked at same speed (not the middle of the pan faster like most non-stick pans).

Duck non-stick.

Treated myself to Le Creuset and will probably never have to buy something again lol.

Sadly, metal hot make food hot is not the only factor. It's also the speed and responsiveness of the pan. If you have the money, look into 3-ply pans, stainless bottom (for induction, but works with everything), aluminum interior (for eveness of heat throughout the pan) and stainless interior/cooking surface. I've had some of my pans for 40 years and they look brand new. They're just as easy to clean as non-stick, if you use wooden utensils for a quick scrape before cleaning. All-clad is probably the best brand, I bought some recently, and they are just as good as the old ones I have, very rare these days. They can be found on eBay and craigslist used, and the used are just as good (have a few of those as well).

I love my cast iron pans, especially for searing and tortillas, but for sauces and risottos, 3-ply is a great option. It's really about the responsiveness.

Last thing, ceramisised cast-iron (like Le Creuset) is terrific for deep frying.

Give cast iron a try. It's cheap, lasts forever, and can be just as non stick as any "non stick" pan. Just clean it out and oil it again after use.. Or leave it be.. I'm not here to start a cast iron cleaning war

Cast iron pans are fucking heavy. As soon as I tried picking one up, I knew I don't want to cook with that on a regular basis.

I have gone through several non stick pans and they all suck because they will wear out relatively quickly. Eventually things will start to stick, and then you are in trouble because you have to treat them gently to avoid scraping off the nonstick coating, so you end up in a catch 22 situation where you can't actually scrub stuff off without making it worse.

I switched to a stainless steel pan about a year ago and I love it. The weight is somewhere in between cast iron and most nonstick pans. I've never had anything get horribly stuck to it, and it's not difficult to clean because you can use abrasive sponges or whatever without damaging it.