The skillet won’t take on that shiny black patina just yet, but once you dry it with paper towels, it will be ready to use. So long as your spouse will allow it, bring your grill grates inside the house and wash them in the sink with hot soapy water and steel wool or a stiff brush. This will remove any seasoning you’ve built up, but will also remove any surface rust, bringing your grate back to bare metal. Yes, you’re probably not baking a cake at 500 degrees, but you can still put a thin layer of oil on your skillet and bake it anyway.

• I should mention, for everyone reading this blog, that the perfectly seasoned cast iron pan will not behave like those slick, non-stick pans available on the market.
• Lard will go rancid over time, so if your pan spends too much time in your cupboard, it might develop and off smell.
• Galvanic problems can also occur with the use of aluminum if certain types of electrolytes are present.
• Use the solution on a sponge to scrub away light grease stains from hard surfaces, like countertops, linoleum, the stovetop and even pots and pans.

Avoid metal bristles or pads, which can remove the skillet’s seasoning. For best results, get in the habit of seasoning your skillet after most uses. Routine seasoning isn’t hard, and it doesn’t take a lot of time. Cook about 2-4 steaks, depending on how many people you plan to serve.

How Do I Season A Brand New Cast Iron Skillet?

I have seen metal replacements for this handle that are okay in the oven up to 450 degrees as well. Now, my kitchen scale is not super accurate and I was measuring with a measuring tape, so these are approximations. But they’re pretty reasonable approximations for our purposes, and what they seem to show is that the Griswold pan is, if anything, a bit thinner than the Falk pan. If these two pans were exactly the same diameter, etc. we would expect the Falk pan to have greater thermal capacity. I do clean mine with liquid dish soap in warm water with non-scratch sponges and seems to do no harm. Getting the small bits of cooked flour and protein out is important in future flavors.

Whats The Best Kind Of Oil To Season A Cast Iron Pan?

However, if you don’t season your cast iron cookware, not only will it quickly become rusted, it will also be a nightmare to cook with causing all of your ingredients to stick. That countertop crushed ice maker ’s why you need the best oil to season cast iron to make the most out of this hardwearing, highly popular cookware. Seasoning a cast iron pan is a natural way of creating non-stick cookware.

This Amazon brand canola oil can do just as good a job as any other option on this list. It has been developed from the same seed oil that is used to create a tough layer over the work of painters and woodworkers. But, don’t worry, that doesn’t mean that it isn’t safe to use. This is a drying oil that has been derived from the food-grade equivalent of flaxseed oil.

10 minutes and repeat steps #2 – #6 about 2 to 3 times. You know your job is done when the griddle plate is a nice, dark brown color. The oil will eventually start to smoke (“smoking point”) in minutes. The low smoke point matters to me because I do not have to spend as much time between the different layers of seasoning the griddle.

Even if you take perfect care of your cast iron, it will probably need to be re-seasoned at some point or another. When the seasoning starts to look dull , just wash it with warm, soapy water and a brush and repeat the seasoning process. If there’s a „layer of oil“ on the pan, that’s what will form that soft coating that flakes off.

If the griddle is in poor shape, use a little bit of soap with warm water, but make sure you wash the soap thoroughly. This is, by far, the most common heat source for your cast iron griddle. The fire underneath the griddle plate will quickly spread out and provide a complete heat coverage. Some stove manufacturers have exact griddle types that can tightly fit their gas stovetops. If that’s the case, you will have the best cast iron griddle cooking experience.

Myth 1: Never Cook Tomatoes Or Any Other Acidic Food In Cast Iron

You can use any scrub brush to clean cast-iron pans as long as the bristles aren’t too stiff or rough, which could wear down the seasoning. In writing this guide, we tested many cleaning methods and products that were specifically marketed to extend the life of cast iron or make cleaning easier. But we found that most of them were not worth your money. Wearing rubber gloves and a respirator mask, place the pan in a large trash bag.