memes

¯\(ツ)/¯ wouldn't kill it. Just scrub any flakes off and re-season. The abuse they can take is almost unreasonable.

In all fairness by the looks of the carbon buildup on the outside this skillet is due to be reseasoned. I doubt the dishwasher will do much to help; this thing needs a lye bath or electrolysis at this point.

I just stripped my 20+ year-old 10" lodge because the carbon buildup was flaking on the inside. The pan is better than new now as the rough finish has worn considerably (though it isn't glass smooth). I have a lot of fond memories of meals made in this skillet and plan on using it for the rest of my life even though I can afford and own arguably better quality cookware these days.

Cooking has been a hobby of mine for decades now. I have gone through a lot of phases in cooking, especially early on.

I have used cast iron, carbon steel, stainless steel, and a dubious flirtation with all aluminum.

16 years on now and this is what I reach for 100% of the time:

Skillet/sautee: cladded stainless. Both standard side and high sided.

Dutch Oven: Enameled cast iron.

Pots Pans: Cladded stainless steel. For smaller 1qt to 2qt I like All Clads D5 for its heat retention. Larger than that I like the D3 for its lighter weight

Grill Pan: cast iron. Hate the excessive weight though

Non-stick: Ceramic coated aluminum. What ever Americas Test Kitchen recommends that year. I consider these disposable items. I stopped using TEFLON a long time ago.

I used cast iron skillets for several years. I found them to be finicky. Heat retention was stupidly high and that's not always a good thing. Excessively heavy and god forbid you attempt any sort of tomato based sauce or anything acidic for that matter. Circumstances forced me to use stainless steel and I just found it matches my needs in a kitchen much better than cast iron. It gets used, it gets cleaned and I put it away. No having to have the vaginal juices of a thousand virgins on hand to make sure it doesn't destroy the next egg I try to cook.

I consider cast iron skillets like safety razors. They had their day, but continue on because of a dedicated set of die hard users. Nothing wrong with that, just not my thing.

The above goes for carbon steel as well, although it usually isn't nearly as heavy.

Unseasonably mad

I just reseasoned my 12” Lodge today! A lot of nasty smells coming out as I took off layers and layers of old seasoning with barkeeper’s friend. But now it has a non sticky, glassy smooth new sunflower oil seasoning. Very slick!

Does anyone know how to avoid having bacon foul up the seasoning? Seems like it always reacts chemically and incorporates proteins into the seasoning which make it nasty and dry and flaky rather than smooth and glassy.

Also throw in the metal fork you used to scrape your expensive non-stick pan.

The look of that pan somebody needs Go ahead and strip it back down to bare and restart seasoning.

Carbon steel > cast iron. Lighter, basically the same heat properties, and you don't get peer pressured into unnecessarily babying a lump of solid metal.

Seriously no reason to dote on either of them so much. Only real care you need to take is that they can rust, so don't leave them wet. And don't needlessly scrub them with chain mail or angle grinders, or you might need to take a few minutes fixing them with cooking oil and the oven.

Why do you hate cast iron?

I use the washer and then let it sit wet over night to bring out its natural paprika seasoning.

Wash it all you want, should be fine as long as you hand dry it after.