Seasoning the cookware

SteveDallas · 10-23-2005, 05:48 PM

In preparation for the arrival of Petri, our new pet cockatiel,* we've dumped our nonstick cookware (which was, admittedly, getting kind of scruffy anyway) in favor of a set of copper-bottomed stainless steel pots and pans. (Teflon fumes are toxic to birds.) The instructions say that after washing up the pans, we should wipe cooking oil on the interior before storing them.

What does this do? Do people actually do it? I'm far from a neat freak, but cooking utenstils is one area where I won't accept the slightest sloppiness. And the thought of putting away a saucepan coated with oil seems just flat-out icky.

*He's currently in the posession of Mrs. Dallas, who's visiting friends & relatives in Boston with a friend of hers who has kept birds for years, and who offered to hook us up with a cockatiel breeder she knows after we decided we wanted a bird. I'm sure I'll have some pictures posted in about 24 hours.

BrianR · 10-23-2005, 08:04 PM

It's not seasoning in the strict sense of the word. That is for cast iron.

What you are doing is wiping a LIGHT film of food-grade oil on the pans to protect them from corrosion while in storage. This is not strictly necessary if you use them regularly. Just make sure they're clean and use care cleaning the copper parts. Beware verdigris!

Brian "owner of two copper-bottomed saucepans"

footfootfoot · 10-23-2005, 08:12 PM

If the cookware truly is stainless steel, then no oil is needed. If it is not stainless, e.g. high carbon steel, like an ordinary wok, then you must be absolutely sure it is bone dry before you put it away or it will rust.

There is a lot of misinformation, hoodoo, and snake oil afoot in the world of commerce and I bet they are just telling you this so you think you are doing something special to your cookware. Anointing it as it were. Some people feel they have to do something extra to their toys to keep their specialness alive, rubbing oil on stainless steel qualifies as one of those things.

Cast iron is another matter entirely, and unless specifically requested I will forgoe the lesson in C.I. upkeep, as i don't have time now. (though my spidey sense tells me that either xoBruce or BigV or Busterb could pinch hit here)

If you can't bear to leave your pans high and dry (you strike me as a pan hanging kind of guy, rather than under the counter) then coat them with an unrefined oil that is not likely to go rancid easily, i.e. walnut oil. Most cheap cooking oil regardless of its provenance is three quarters on its way to being varnish. (long high heat in refining polymerizes the oil, that is why it is gummy around the top of the bottle you found in the back of the cupboard.)

At our house we go through about a gallon of olive oil every other month, so that doesn't happen, but when I have visited non cooking types or people with a fear of oil, it is pretty common.

There.

BigV · 10-24-2005, 06:13 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by footfootfoot

--snip--
Cast iron is another matter entirely, and unless specifically requested I will forgoe the lesson in C.I. upkeep, as i don't have time now. (though my spidey sense tells me that either xoBruce or BigV or Busterb could pinch hit here)
---snip--There.

Right again.

footfootfoot · 10-24-2005, 09:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by BigV

Right again.

Well done V!
May I add an alternate technique, highly effective if no one else is in the house?

Cook (read burn) the pan clean. The trick is to do it slowly enough that you don't burn the seasoning off in the process. i.e. don't burn it dry. Keep adding a wipe of oil as you burn any sticking food off. I use a spatula to scrape the bottom clean as the food dries. If the pan is well seasoned to begin with, sometimes just heating the empty pan will dry the food to a point where it lifts with gentle persuasion.

Otherwise you can "burn" and oil it clean, effectively seasoning it s you are going along.

Iron rules!

Beestie · 10-23-2005, 08:42 PM

There's a food-grade mineral oil for just such an application - I wouldn't use olive oil. Any gourmet store would have it (drawing a blank on the name).

Tonchi · 10-24-2005, 01:50 AM

Foot told you everything you need to know, really good info. The only thing you have to think about is the copper bottoms. Mostly that plate of copper is really thin, but if you aren't using the pan and store it for a long time, either outside your house or in an area where there is a lot of humidity, it can develop spots of verdigris. I don't know if the oil prevents that or not, it happened to me when some bronzed bookends and the Revere Ware stayed in a mini-storage for 10 years. The only other suggestion I would make is to always put a sheet of Viva or a paper table napkin between each of your pans nested together. Then they don't slide around and get scratched.

SteveDallas · 10-24-2005, 08:50 AM

Thanks for the comments--we'll go with the "dry" option then as I was leaning toward anyway. And yes, I do hang them up.

Tonchi, they are recommending oil for the interior, not the exterior where the copper is. They don't suggest any special care for the outside beyond the usual ("wash with warm soapy water, don't use steel wool").

busterb · 10-24-2005, 10:39 AM

If the copper bottoms ever need cleaning, sprinkel some white vinagar and table salt and rub w/rag, then rinse dry.

footfootfoot · 10-24-2005, 05:48 PM

Yeah, Tonch and Buster tell it true. You don't need copper cleaner for the bottoms. Any mild acid will clean them up nice. Oiling the outside of a pan will cause soot problems when the flame is applied.

Mineral oil will work, but I wouldn't try seasoning C.I. with it. It is often recommended for salad bowls etc. but it doesn't really ever dry. Walnut oil will dry.

Gotta go, dinner time.

Clodfobble · 10-24-2005, 08:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tonchi

The only other suggestion I would make is to always put a sheet of Viva or a paper table napkin between each of your pans nested together. Then they don't slide around and get scratched.

I was always taught to nest them backwards; that is, not nested at all, smallest pan on the the bottom, biggest on the top. They balance just fine and none of them can scratch each other.

Urbane Guerrilla · 10-25-2005, 05:21 AM

Hmmp. Save up for waterless cookware. The aluminum-cored variety does what cast iron does only faster and on less fuel because aluminum has less mass and conducts heat faster.

I've spent at least forty-six of my forty-nine years hating carrots. It is incredible what cooking the orange Bugs Bunny root does when you cook it waterless. It actually keeps the carrot's natural sugars within the root where you can enjoy them -- cures the whole reason cooked carrots taste bad: those sugars leaching out into the water and getting poured down the drain along with the water-soluble vitamins.

Waterless cookware comes high. Cutco's waterless is the least expensive -- nothing wrong with it, it's just that we can market it as a sideline to our kitchen cutlery business and pare a lot of costs that way, so we can sell it for a lot less.

We used to demonstrate the cookware by boiling an egg -- without water. The eggs tended to explode and throw the pan lid at the ceiling no matter how low we turned the gas -- waterless cookware should only be cooking at low temperatures. What you spend on cookware you make back in the fuel you don't use, and the better quality of the meat dishes you cook this way. They retain more of their juices and more of their precooked weight, and the meat comes out nice and juicy. It's a great way to cook pork.

Nowadays, we can do a simple small cooking demo by cooking pineapple upside down cake on the stove top -- following the directions on one package of Jiffy mix, a can of pineapple rings, and some brown sugar, and oh yeah, a little butter to start by melting the sugar in before you plop the pineapple rings down. Your can will have one more slice than you have room for in that pan; eat it. The cake doesn't stay around for long after you invert it out of the pan. I've also assisted at demos of the entire set of cookware that created a supper, which we then sat down and ate, to considerable lip-smacking and nummy-sounds. One thing we tell our clients about the cookware is if you turned off the heat under the pan and then you can't get the lid off it (the lid seals down onto the pan to cook the food best, and the lids have the same conductive core as the pan bodies do), just heat the pan on medium for five or ten seconds and it'll come off. We've been called up by hungry desperate people before on their first big meal.

It's a very different way of cooking. You can stack waterless pans atop each other on one single burner and cook everything in the stack. You have to educate yourself not to use so high a heat as you used to. People ask us if the cookware's nonstick. We tell them food sticks because of hot spots in the pan; when the heat's completely even within a few degrees you don't get sticking problems. No Teflon, no teflon troubles.

10-23-2005, 05:48 PM	#1
SteveDallas Your Bartender Join Date: Jan 2002 Location: Philly Burbs, PA Posts: 7,651	Seasoning the cookware In preparation for the arrival of Petri, our new pet cockatiel,* we've dumped our nonstick cookware (which was, admittedly, getting kind of scruffy anyway) in favor of a set of copper-bottomed stainless steel pots and pans. (Teflon fumes are toxic to birds.) The instructions say that after washing up the pans, we should wipe cooking oil on the interior before storing them. What does this do? Do people actually do it? I'm far from a neat freak, but cooking utenstils is one area where I won't accept the slightest sloppiness. And the thought of putting away a saucepan coated with oil seems just flat-out icky. *He's currently in the posession of Mrs. Dallas, who's visiting friends & relatives in Boston with a friend of hers who has kept birds for years, and who offered to hook us up with a cockatiel breeder she knows after we decided we wanted a bird. I'm sure I'll have some pictures posted in about 24 hours.

10-23-2005, 08:04 PM	#2
BrianR Cleverly disguised as a responsible adult Join Date: Jan 2001 Location: Dallas, TX Posts: 3,338	It's not seasoning in the strict sense of the word. That is for cast iron. What you are doing is wiping a LIGHT film of food-grade oil on the pans to protect them from corrosion while in storage. This is not strictly necessary if you use them regularly. Just make sure they're clean and use care cleaning the copper parts. Beware verdigris! Brian "owner of two copper-bottomed saucepans" __________________ Never be afraid to tell the world who you are. -- Anonymous

10-23-2005, 08:12 PM	#3
footfootfoot To shreds, you say? Join Date: Aug 2004 Location: in the house and on the street-how many, many feet we meet! Posts: 18,449	If the cookware truly is stainless steel, then no oil is needed. If it is not stainless, e.g. high carbon steel, like an ordinary wok, then you must be absolutely sure it is bone dry before you put it away or it will rust. There is a lot of misinformation, hoodoo, and snake oil afoot in the world of commerce and I bet they are just telling you this so you think you are doing something special to your cookware. Anointing it as it were. Some people feel they have to do something extra to their toys to keep their specialness alive, rubbing oil on stainless steel qualifies as one of those things. Cast iron is another matter entirely, and unless specifically requested I will forgoe the lesson in C.I. upkeep, as i don't have time now. (though my spidey sense tells me that either xoBruce or BigV or Busterb could pinch hit here) If you can't bear to leave your pans high and dry (you strike me as a pan hanging kind of guy, rather than under the counter) then coat them with an unrefined oil that is not likely to go rancid easily, i.e. walnut oil. Most cheap cooking oil regardless of its provenance is three quarters on its way to being varnish. (long high heat in refining polymerizes the oil, that is why it is gummy around the top of the bottle you found in the back of the cupboard.) At our house we go through about a gallon of olive oil every other month, so that doesn't happen, but when I have visited non cooking types or people with a fear of oil, it is pretty common. There. __________________ The internet is a hateful stew of vomit you can never take completely seriously. - Her Fobs

10-23-2005, 08:42 PM	#6
Beestie -◊\|≡·∙■·∙≡\|◊- Join Date: Feb 2003 Location: Parts unknown. Posts: 4,081	There's a food-grade mineral oil for just such an application - I wouldn't use olive oil. Any gourmet store would have it (drawing a blank on the name). __________________ ♠ ♥ ♣ ♦

10-24-2005, 01:50 AM	#7
Tonchi Victim of gravity Join Date: Mar 2005 Location: Hiding in plain sight Posts: 1,412	Foot told you everything you need to know, really good info. The only thing you have to think about is the copper bottoms. Mostly that plate of copper is really thin, but if you aren't using the pan and store it for a long time, either outside your house or in an area where there is a lot of humidity, it can develop spots of verdigris. I don't know if the oil prevents that or not, it happened to me when some bronzed bookends and the Revere Ware stayed in a mini-storage for 10 years. The only other suggestion I would make is to always put a sheet of Viva or a paper table napkin between each of your pans nested together. Then they don't slide around and get scratched. __________________ Everything you've ever heard about Fresno is true.

10-24-2005, 08:50 AM	#8
SteveDallas Your Bartender Join Date: Jan 2002 Location: Philly Burbs, PA Posts: 7,651	Thanks for the comments--we'll go with the "dry" option then as I was leaning toward anyway. And yes, I do hang them up. Tonchi, they are recommending oil for the interior, not the exterior where the copper is. They don't suggest any special care for the outside beyond the usual ("wash with warm soapy water, don't use steel wool").

10-24-2005, 10:39 AM	#9
busterb NSABFD Join Date: Jul 2004 Location: MS. usa Posts: 3,908	If the copper bottoms ever need cleaning, sprinkel some white vinagar and table salt and rub w/rag, then rinse dry. __________________ I've haven't left very deep footprints in the sands of time. But, boy I've left a bunch.

10-24-2005, 05:48 PM	#10
footfootfoot To shreds, you say? Join Date: Aug 2004 Location: in the house and on the street-how many, many feet we meet! Posts: 18,449	Yeah, Tonch and Buster tell it true. You don't need copper cleaner for the bottoms. Any mild acid will clean them up nice. Oiling the outside of a pan will cause soot problems when the flame is applied. Mineral oil will work, but I wouldn't try seasoning C.I. with it. It is often recommended for salad bowls etc. but it doesn't really ever dry. Walnut oil will dry. Gotta go, dinner time. __________________ The internet is a hateful stew of vomit you can never take completely seriously. - Her Fobs

10-25-2005, 05:21 AM	#12
Urbane Guerrilla Person who doesn't update the user title Join Date: Jul 2002 Location: Southern California Posts: 6,674	Hmmp. Save up for waterless cookware. The aluminum-cored variety does what cast iron does only faster and on less fuel because aluminum has less mass and conducts heat faster. I've spent at least forty-six of my forty-nine years hating carrots. It is incredible what cooking the orange Bugs Bunny root does when you cook it waterless. It actually keeps the carrot's natural sugars within the root where you can enjoy them -- cures the whole reason cooked carrots taste bad: those sugars leaching out into the water and getting poured down the drain along with the water-soluble vitamins. Waterless cookware comes high. Cutco's waterless is the least expensive -- nothing wrong with it, it's just that we can market it as a sideline to our kitchen cutlery business and pare a lot of costs that way, so we can sell it for a lot less. We used to demonstrate the cookware by boiling an egg -- without water. The eggs tended to explode and throw the pan lid at the ceiling no matter how low we turned the gas -- waterless cookware should only be cooking at low temperatures. What you spend on cookware you make back in the fuel you don't use, and the better quality of the meat dishes you cook this way. They retain more of their juices and more of their precooked weight, and the meat comes out nice and juicy. It's a great way to cook pork. Nowadays, we can do a simple small cooking demo by cooking pineapple upside down cake on the stove top -- following the directions on one package of Jiffy mix, a can of pineapple rings, and some brown sugar, and oh yeah, a little butter to start by melting the sugar in before you plop the pineapple rings down. Your can will have one more slice than you have room for in that pan; eat it. The cake doesn't stay around for long after you invert it out of the pan. I've also assisted at demos of the entire set of cookware that created a supper, which we then sat down and ate, to considerable lip-smacking and nummy-sounds. One thing we tell our clients about the cookware is if you turned off the heat under the pan and then you can't get the lid off it (the lid seals down onto the pan to cook the food best, and the lids have the same conductive core as the pan bodies do), just heat the pan on medium for five or ten seconds and it'll come off. We've been called up by hungry desperate people before on their first big meal. It's a very different way of cooking. You can stack waterless pans atop each other on one single burner and cook everything in the stack. You have to educate yourself not to use so high a heat as you used to. People ask us if the cookware's nonstick. We tell them food sticks because of hot spots in the pan; when the heat's completely even within a few degrees you don't get sticking problems. No Teflon, no teflon troubles. __________________ Wanna stop school shootings? End Gun-Free Zones, of course. Last edited by Urbane Guerrilla; 10-25-2005 at 05:25 AM.

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