For some years now, every Labor Day, a group of friends from around Texas have gotten together and played board games. We stay in a cabin in the words, gloriously off the grid and away from mobile technology... for the most part. This cabin belongs to a friend's family and has some fairly old cookware in it... by 'fairly old' I mean vintage cast iron. Each year I forget to check if it is Wagner, Griswald or neither. It doesn't really matter, its at least two generations old, and good as new. When I cook on it, I'm always amazed at how truly non-stick it really is. I also learn what it means to be non-stick. Your food won't be slippin' and slidin' all over the place. You won't have to chase your grilled cheese as it slides away from your spatula... but if you pay attention to what you are doing, your food will not burn or stick and clean up will be a breeze..
After doing some cooking at the cabin, I decided to get back into cast iron. Readers may remember that I had a fun adventure seasoning my Lodge cast iron skillet some years ago. I may also have mentioned that at one point the seasoning started to flake off, and I just got fed up, packed it in a box
for my move and forgot about it... too much trouble... That was old ignorance... I took the old lodge out of the box, and, I must have done something right, because the cooking surface was unmarred. There were a few spots of about 1 millimeter of rust on the outside and handle, but other than that, it looked EXACTLY like it did when I put it in the box years ago.
A little elbow grease and a single layer of re-seasoning and presto... it was back in action. I used it for a few simple meals this week and was reminded of some of the things I really like about cast iron. First, it is easy to find pieces made in the U.S.A. I do not have the room to explain why that's important... but suffice it to say that it is important to me.
Second, cast iron is indestructible... If anything you do in your kitchen can damage cast iron, you need to consider joining the Avengers. On that note, you can do what you need to do... you can slam that STAINLESS STEEL spatula against that pan and flip that egg... you can take it off the stove with that sizzling steak and put it in a 500 degree oven... you can take a metal knife and cut into that steak or chicken to see how done it is. A lot of this would ruin other cookware.. and trust me.. I've ruined some cookware... I've melted nylon forks in steaks and caught pots (yes plural) on fire.
Third, its cheap. You will spend one tenth on cast iron what you will spend for other quality non-stick cookware. You will also typically replace every piece of non-stick cookware at least once in your life which doubles its cost.
Fourth, no 'chemicals' or should I say no 'weird' industrial chemicals you and medical science don't really know much about come near your food. It's iron.... dug up from the ground and made from rocks... you understand rocks and iron... you probably don't know where the heck Polytetrafluoroethylene comes from or even what it is... but people cook on it. With cast iron, you can also avoid silicon, nylon, and all kinds of other petroleum or polymer based utensils. The only thing that will leach into your food is iron.
Most important of all... IT COOKS GREAT!!!! Last night as an experiment, I fried shredded cheddar cheese in it, and nothing stuck. This morning, I cooked my breakfast in it, and was amazed... I've only recently been trying to make omelets 'the right way,' and had I known how to flip this baby this morning, it would have been restaurant quality. The secret to an omelette is 1) use butter.. and 2) to cook it slowly until it is thoroughly firm and able to fold.. I messed up the fold.. but otherwise it was fluffy and just right.
