Mothering › Forums › Natural Family Living › The Mindful Home › help! need explicit instructions for cooking with cast iron
New Posts  All Forums:Forum Nav:

help! need explicit instructions for cooking with cast iron - Page 2

post #21 of 27
I think I must be very, very picky about my eggs (well, I know that I am..). I like the whites just-so, the yolk heated, but not cooked, and perfectly runny, the egg only flipped one time, etc, etc, and on and on and on. Any imperfect fried eggs get fed to the dog. Every time.

It's hard to get that sort of pickiness with cast iron.

And mine is very well seasoned. It was my great-grandmother's before it was mine. It is slick and black. We once figured out that it was from the 40s. That's a lot of years of frying chicken and cornbread. And, it does scrambled eggs just fine.

So, some of this depends on how perfect you want your eggs to look.
post #22 of 27
I'm a bonafied cast iron gal. I use mine about every day. You've gotten a lot of good info, but as is the nature of things most everybody seems to have a different method. I'll throw in my points... I SWEAR by LARD. Pork fat is the VERY VERY VERY best fat for seasoning a cast iron pan. Coconut oil second. Butter third. IME, anyway. Palm oil shortening might be good as well, but I've not tried it. I wouldn't even bother with other oils... Saturated fat is where it's at. Most vegetable oils get thick and gummy, not thin and slick. Who ever said to go on bacon frying spree had it right... That is the lazy man's seasoning practice there.

As far as frying and egg... Please do yourself a favor and DO NOT let your pan get TOO hot. Yes, WARM the pan then add the fat. But if your egg lets off more than a very weak sizzle when it hits the pan you are gonna have a tough rubber egg with the creepy crispy edges(maybe people like that?) that is more likely to stick. Room temp eggs stick less than cold. And I don't know if you have ever seen the old school directions for how to fry an egg, but they would basically swim the egg in fat and spoon the hot oil over the top to set it. I flip, personally, but still like a good healthy layer or fat in my fan... My eggs float right onto my spatula... Tilt the pan towards your spatula. Scrambled is different... I pour the prescrambled eggs into a moderately hot and oiled pan, let it sit 15 seconds or so, slide/scrape the spatula over the bottom of the pan pushing the cooked portion into a pile of sorts, keeping it moving... this allows the runny stuff to spill into the pan. When most of the runny stuff is done, I flip the big pile of cooked to set the runny stuff on top. Turn off your heat(cast iron holds a lot) and chop up the big fluffy pile of scrambleds. This takes all of two, possibly three, minutes for a dozen eggs. It would be probably thirty seconds for two or three eggs. Don't have your heat too high and don't over cook your eggs... Your eggs will taste better and your pan won't get so gunked up.

When all is said and done, I don't even wash the pan... I just let the pan cool off a bit and wipe out the little crispies left in it. If the crispies are persistent I'll run warm water in there and gently(or firmly, no big deal really, it depends) scrub out with a stainless curly scrubby thing. Don't be afraid to leave your pan greasy! Water ought to bead up and roll off. I don't worry about rancid oil or anything... I use it so often, it doesn't sit around in there. If it has been a while I'll heat my pan and wipe out with a damp cloth to remove any residual oil that might be "off".

There is a delicate balance... Yes these things take a beating. You can really screw them up a thousand times and then fix them. The line begins where you get tired of fixing. It's a learning curve and you'll figure it out. It's fun, and a challenge. And I am PROUD of my pan, in a weird way. It took a lot of scrubbing off screwed up gummy seasons, rubbing out the rust, smoky kitchen, cursed scrambled eggs to get my pan to it's silky black duck-like shine. And yes, I CAN make pancakes without adding fat to the pan. But it took my three years of fiddling around to get my season right. Good luck and don't give up!
post #23 of 27
Thought of this thread today when I made a scrambled egg with no oil or butter or other fat in my Lodge pre-seasoned griddle pan. I let it soak in some plain water while I washed the other dishes and it wiped right out. No problem at all. You really don't have to do much to it. Don't overthink!
post #24 of 27
Just came across this thread... I'm in the process of rehab'ing some neglected cast iron skillets back to a usuable condition.

Like other posters - season the pan. For me, its not a one time thing, but a constant until they get black, smooth and shiny. I have 2 skillets DH got from his mom, and they are so black, and so smooth I know they were well used and loved for a long time by his grandparents and beyond.

Another tip we do - after using the cast iron for a meal, rinse with hot water or hot water & salt, put it back on the burner and reheat a bit. Wipe out excess water and get out the oil or grease of your choice. I'm a big fan of bacon grease. It does wonders!!

Put a tsp in - melt and wipe excess with cloth, continue to heat over low. Do this twice, turn burners off and let cool. If your skillets feel "sticky" reheat & wipe off excess grease. This help to season them I think just a smidge quicker along with weekly trips to my oven to season for an hour or 3 a time over the weekends.
post #25 of 27
Here's a picture of my favorite cast iron skillet after cooking four scrambled eggs in it with a tiny sliver of butter for grease...

http://eingefangen.smugmug.com/Other...18_7L4Qb-M.jpg

It's pretty much non-stick, proof!
post #26 of 27
Well, I can tell you how not to do it! I read some of this thread a month or more ago and then put a cast iron skillet on my birthday list. I remembered some but planned to go back and revisit the thread when my skillet came. Well, it came last night just before I went to bed, and I really wanted to use it to make breakfast this morning (eggs), so I decided to give it a try.

I took my "preseasoned" lodge skillet and warmed it up on medium, put less than a tablespoon of ghee in, cracked my fridge cold eggs onto the hot skillet, cooked for a while, tried to flip, made a mess, cooked some more, flipped again, and served

The residue certainly didn't rinse off. I boiled water in it, scraped, scrubbed, rinsed. There was still more left. I boiled more water in it, but my baby fell asleep in my lap before I could take care of it. I napped with her and came back to my pan rusting on the stove. After I scrubbed out the rust, I had a nice, clean, and mostly unseasoned skillet. I've been spending the rest of the day seasoning it right, and I'm looking forward to eggs swimming in fat tomorrow morning. At least I've had fun!
post #27 of 27
You need more fat. I have no idea how much butter I use but probably closer to 2+ tbsp... Enough to coat the botom of the skillet all over very well. It takes practice, but you'll get it!!
New Posts  All Forums:Forum Nav:
  Return Home
  Back to Forum: The Mindful Home
Mothering › Forums › Natural Family Living › The Mindful Home › help! need explicit instructions for cooking with cast iron