Food

Thanks! You’ve found it to not stick? I know everyone raves about carbon steel etc but sometimes they’re a little bit of a pita 😬 and with dad lyfe in full flow I have to choose my hipster passion lifestyle choices discerningly

I bought this a year or two ago and now do 80% of my cooking in it. So versatile. Bomb proof. Lovely to look at and a dream on induction. Easy to clean and looks brand new all the time. Doesn't stick but you need to be relatively careful - make sure it's up to temp, make sure you're moving it when it needs to, resting it when it doesn't etc.

https://www.kingsandqueens.org.uk/products/de-buyer-affinity-saute-pan-stainless-steel-20cm

I'm slowly building out to all Affinity pans. Picked up a 14cm and 18cm saucepan with lids. Casserole thing which I use as a wide deep pan for pasta etc

Next up is their wok (flat bottom and two side handles rather than one long one so not sure how it'll be for tossing but reviews are all very good):

https://www.debuyer-brandshop.com/en/de-Buyer-Stainless-Steel-WOK-32-cm-AFFINITY/33134

We have one of John Lewis’ ‘The Pan’ ones - good until the non-stick started to come off - but they’ve got a lifetime guarantee and had no issues replacing:
https://www.johnlewis.com/john-lewis-the-pan-stainless-steel-lidded-non-stick-saute-pan-24cm/p5758132

Also probs a lot friendlier to post-reno wallets!

Stainless is brilliant. As long as you don’t try to nuke food with it. Also induction hobs can warp pans if used at full whack.

Cleaning is just soak and wipe off or put in dishwasher.

@hvsds thanks for that - I was looking at the Le Creuset non-stick bc that has a lifetime guarantee and is ok for the oven up to 250 (vs 180 for JL one). But the JL version is more wallet friendly!

@CYOA you like the DeBuyers then? I have a few Mauviel pans which I really like the balance of but they don’t have a guarantee like Le creuset, I think Debuyer is similar?

If you put in the dishwasher do you need to re-season/oil everytime or it’s good to go straight after?

Stainless doesn’t need seasoning. It’s not a carbon steel. A sauté pan is really a large low saucepan. Large surface area helps soften lots of onion all at once and also helps with reducing fluid.

It can be used for frying but the vertical sides make it poorly suited for things like fish with a delicate skin where you may want to slide a frying flip underneath.

If it was up to me, all our pans would be either
Stainless
Carbon / blue steel
Cast Iron.
IMO anything non stick is essentially a disposable product, just a matter of whether it's 2/3 years or 5/6 years before it's trashed.

As it is, the stainless ones get used by everyone, blue steel and cast iron mainly by me and a couple of non stick ones for people who cba with using blue steel for eggs, omelettes etc.

I do. I'm not fussed about guarantees with a company like that. If it'll fail, it'll fail within the two years, not 15 and by then I've had more than a decent run of it. I get a lot of pleasure and consistent results cooking with them.

I've had le creuset stuff in the the past and enjoyed them but I like homogeneity, not a mix. So when an errant FiL scraped my giant nonstick le creuset pan with a metal spatula, ruining it like some fuckwit 8 year old, and my MiL dropped and broke my stoneware casserole (within a month of each other), I thought I'd switch.

I still have my cast iron skeppshults, but hide them.

I have this Le Creuset non-stick saute pan https://www.lecreuset.co.uk/en_GB/p/toughened-non-stick-saut%C3%A9-pan-with-helper-handle/TN51110a.html?dwvar_TN51110a_color=black&dwvar_TN51110a_size=28cm-l5-4

Got it 3 years ago, use it a lot (including in the oven) and the non-stick definitely isn't what it was when I bought it. No metal implements and not been in the dishwasher so just deteriorated from everyday use.

Will probably try the guarantee soon.

I am aiming to move away from non stick pans as the coating fails and is a pollutant.

When my non stick le creuset pans fail I’ll use angle grinder and polish off the nonstick

Steel pan from hoo hing?

There's a company that re coats nonstick pans in Germany. Will try with one of our le creuset ones after a try with warranty. But after a few years and people overheating them and other stupid stuff I don't think they'll exchange.
If it was my decision there would be less non stick in the household, it's stupid.

Ok, that's an interesting option.
Do you think there is a standard le creuset stainless pan underneath?

As far as I understand they are the same 3ply pan but with added coating.

Eg their 24cm 3ply frying pan comes in coated and non coated variants.

The anodized aluminium stuff is a different game to Teflon coated steel - I've always found it to be much harder wearing.

he coating fails and is a pollutant.

Fun fact - while teflon is relatively inert, when it's very hot, the offgassing is not.

Would make sense.
If the stuff came off easily with a sanding thingy on the grinder leaving a surface that works that would be nice.

https://easykitchenguide.com/how-to-remove-non-stick-coating/

Yes, I've got some Circulon infinite pans with the anodized aluminium stuff which are still going strong after more than ten years.

Sadly our circulon pans are not induction friendly.

I got a bit lucky in that the ones I bought years ago with no thoughts of being used with an induction hob did turn out to be compatible.

https://www.theguardian.com/food/2023/may/03/how-to-make-the-perfect-pasta-primavera-recipe-felicity-cloake

Made this at the weekend, was delicious!

Any tips for good/authentic/ easy beef rendang recipe?