new love in my life

All these years I've been obsessed with cooking, and I've never owned a cast iron skillet.  I have enameled cast iron pots, and every size and variety of pan you can imagine, but cast iron never won my heart.  I know people swear by them, but when I would look at them, they looked awkward with their thick walls and stubby handles, and I never bought one.  I'm sure I have missed out on a superb cooking tool.

The other day, I think I found MY version of cast iron.  It's called a mineral pan, and referred to as "steel" in several places, but it is 99 percent iron.  Watching yet another foodie show, this one a "best of" affair with Alton Brown, I saw this pan.  The restaurant was purported to have the best mac 'n cheese in the states, and the chef said he had searched far and wide for a way to get a baked-like crust on mac 'n  cheese cooked to order.  He finally settled on a French cast iron pan.

My new pan, after use #2

I am in love.  After cleaning off the wax coating, and seasoning the pan with peanut oil, it is already slicker than owl snot, as they inexplicably say down in Texas.  The idea is for it to get black, the way cast iron does, and after making a burger with a lovely brown crust, and then some hash browns this morning, my pan is on its way to the dark patina I am after.

inaugural run -- even on day one, the melted cheese just wiped right out of the pan

So, enough about the new toy, but I will close up by saying they run small.  I bought the 10 inch pan, but I bet it isn't even eight inches across the bottom, so the measurement must be from rim to rim, and the pan flairs quite a bit.  If I continue to love this pan, I'm sure I'll be buying more of them in larger sizes.  The good news is, in the world of cookware, they are not really very expensive.  The De Buyer one I bought was under 50 dollars.  If they last forever, it will have been a good investment.