Cast iron tips

[MeadowSong_]

I've had a cast iron skillet that I've been using for about 6 months. Almost daily too. Anyways, it was doing fantastic, but now over the past few days, it's started to chip off, like parts of black specks chipping all off of it. WTHeck? I had this happen once to a big dutch oven I had. What am I doing wrong? Can I save it?

[levans]

are you seasoning it?

Wash your cast iron pan in hot water (soak for a short time if necessary), using a small amount of soap only if necessary. Then, quickly dry on a warm burner on the stovetop. When the pan is dry and warm, apply a thin coating of oil over the inner surface of the pan. Do this everytime you wash your pan, it will season your pan with a non-stick, black surface.
The black spots you have seen is the seasoning coming off. This happens occasionally with imperfect care. Maybe it got hot with nothing in the pan or was never washed as above....both would cause the black spots.
You can also try coating every surface of the pan with a thin coating of oil or shortening and putting the pan in a 350 oven for about 30 minutes.

[MeadowSong_]

I actually had been doing that, but had gotten bad about putting a little oil in the pan after each washing because I thought it was pretty well seasoned lol!

I put some Olive oil in it tonight after I washed it, and I've always dried it on a hot burner. Is Olive oil okay to use, or is there another oil that works better?

It does get hot every once in a while with nothing in the pan (no butter, oil or what not), I didn't realize that would do it harm either.

Thanks so much for the tips and ideas. I think I will bake it a while tonight too!

[Limabean1975]

If the surface has rough spots that don't smooth out with scrubbing, you can re-surface it with steel wool, then re-season (oil/shortening in oven) it.

[RootBeerFloat]

No, don't use olive oil. Generally mono- or polyunsaturaed plant oils are bad because they get sticky, and olive oil in particular has a very low smoke point, which isn't good for the food you're cooking. EVCO is great, as is lard. I sometimes use palm shortening, as well.

[Metasequoia]

Palm shortening made mine all sticky. I actually *just* finished stripping them this morning. I ended up soaking them in hot, hot water for like 20 minutes, scrubbing with steel wool & the ick still didn't come off. I resorted to using my nail buffer & "sanding" the stuff off.

Then I dried them in the oven, rubbed them with coconut oil & baked them upside down for an hour. They're *beautiful* now!

[quietserena]

Oh man I was just about to say that palm shortening is what made my egg pan just perfectly seasoned. I keep frying eggs in it and just rinse it out with hot water and a scrubby pad and it's been getting just wonderfully seasoned even without me adding anything to it after I dry it.

MeadowSong_, it could be that your seasoning wasn't as even so it's chipping off. Also I had mine chip off when I thought it was a good idea to use steel wool on my pans. It was gentle but it was still pulling off the seasoning. It seemed to me that the part of the seasoning that was there when I bought the pan was really weak and not stuck enough to the pan. I could be wrong on that though.

Just keep using your pans, use plenty of saturated fat to fry stuff and it'll build itself back up.

yay cast iron!

Oh ETA: If you want to strip your pans (I stripped one of my good will finds.. ugh it was gross) oven spray works really well. I do it outside, spray all over and then stick the pan into a garbage bag overnight and wash in the morning. I however was a soapmaker so I'm not afraid of lye. YMMV

[Limabean1975]

Originally Posted by Ally'smom

No, don't use olive oil. Generally mono- or polyunsaturaed plant oils are bad because they get sticky, and olive oil in particular has a very low smoke point, which isn't good for the food you're cooking. EVCO is great, as is lard. I sometimes use palm shortening, as well.

What's EVCO?

[MeadowSong_]

I'm pretty sure EVCO is Extra Virgin Coconut Oil.

Serena, I think your right, because it's still very non-stick in the middle and it was mainly the outside edges that are chipping, probably because I really don't oil that part when I use it.