Cast iron cooking
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@ndmike said in Cast iron cooking:
processhead nice! I have some Lodge stuff too. It is rougher finished but it works decent. Nothing like old cast iron though. I even have a Griswold Erie Scotch Bowl that was in my wife’s family. It was her Great Grandmas.
Can you post some pictures of the bowl?
processhead yep, I can when I get home after work. It needs to be seasoned as my wife’s aunt didn’t take the best care of it. Little bit of surface/flash rust on it.
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You bet! I have 9 Griswald skillets of various sizes (3-10, plus another 9), a lid for one of those #9 Griswalds, 3 Lodge skillets (8", 12", 15"), and 2 Le Creuset enameled dutch ovens (4.5 qt. round; 7.25 qt. oval).
I also have a couple of molds that we never use, but they are fun for decoration.
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My sons both blacksmith as one of their hobbies. The youngest, who cooks and home brews more, took a lodge and polished the inside with a grinder using a sanding disk. It smoothed out the notorious rough finish and made the lodge a lot better to use. I was a good dad and also passed on a Wagner skillet to him. Wagner Ware was in Sidney, Ohio which is about 50 miles north of me. They made some great CI along with Griswald. I do like the thickness of Lodge for outdoor cooking and camping.
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processhead yep, I can when I get home after work. It needs to be seasoned as my wife’s aunt didn’t take the best care of it. Little bit of surface/flash rust on it.
@ndmike Thats the beauty of CI. A little elbow grease and some TLC will keep them going forever. Try that with a modern “Non stick” skillet.
“You never really die until you end up on the wall at a Cracker Barrel”
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@ndmike Thats the beauty of CI. A little elbow grease and some TLC will keep them going forever. Try that with a modern “Non stick” skillet.
GWG8541 yep for sure. I have seen videos of guys sanding down modern Lodge skillets.
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You bet! I have 9 Griswald skillets of various sizes (3-10, plus another 9), a lid for one of those #9 Griswalds, 3 Lodge skillets (8", 12", 15"), and 2 Le Creuset enameled dutch ovens (4.5 qt. round; 7.25 qt. oval).
I also have a couple of molds that we never use, but they are fun for decoration.
TexLaw that is quite the collection!
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processhead yep, I can when I get home after work. It needs to be seasoned as my wife’s aunt didn’t take the best care of it. Little bit of surface/flash rust on it.
And you can make desert in this stuff. My dad died last August at 91. Still lived on his own until the end. He loved peaches, so I made him a peach upside down cake in the cast iron.
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@ndmike Thanks. I’d love to tell a story that it was acquired over years of searching through garage sales and flea markets, but that just isn’t the case. One of the Griswalds (#9 with the lid) was inherited. Everything else except the other Griswalds was just purchased new over time.
The rest of the Griswalds came as a set that I just happen to fall upon not long after I started looking for Griswald cast iron. Someone had taken serious time to restore them, and they were in perfect condition. Either they didn’t know what they had or they were just trying to unload them, but they were asking less for the set than I see the identical #10 going for on your friendly, neighborhood online auction site. Frankly, I didn’t know what they had, either, or I probably would have offered to may -more- than I did. At the time, I was afraid I was paying too much! I just figured I would splurge, since it was the set!
I guess it really is better to be lucky than good!
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And you can make desert in this stuff. My dad died last August at 91. Still lived on his own until the end. He loved peaches, so I made him a peach upside down cake in the cast iron.
GWG8541 that looks absolutely delicious. I love peaches!
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The Camp Chef cast iron conditioner saved one of my cast iron pans. Huge fan of it. They also have a cleaner but I have not needed to use it yet and the ingredient make me nervous as I was always taught not to clean cast iron with anything citrus and there was some sort of citrus ingredient on the label.
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I have a couple Griswold skillets that I use alot. Bought my wife a set of Le Creuset for Christmas a couple years ago. She says it’s too heavy for her preference. Haven’t been lucky enough to find an old dutch oven at estate sales so bought a couple Cabela’s models. They work well for campfire cooking.
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Gluten free Pineapple
upside down cake
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I have a couple Griswold skillets that I use alot. Bought my wife a set of Le Creuset for Christmas a couple years ago. She says it’s too heavy for her preference. Haven’t been lucky enough to find an old dutch oven at estate sales so bought a couple Cabela’s models. They work well for campfire cooking.
wdaly I haven’t found any old dutch ovens yet either. I bought a Lodge Camp Dutch Oven that I really like.
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Fond memories of my Mom’s pineapple upside down cake made in her No.8 Griswold skillet, now in my daughters kitchen.
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@ndmike Thanks. I’d love to tell a story that it was acquired over years of searching through garage sales and flea markets, but that just isn’t the case. One of the Griswalds (#9 with the lid) was inherited. Everything else except the other Griswalds was just purchased new over time.
The rest of the Griswalds came as a set that I just happen to fall upon not long after I started looking for Griswald cast iron. Someone had taken serious time to restore them, and they were in perfect condition. Either they didn’t know what they had or they were just trying to unload them, but they were asking less for the set than I see the identical #10 going for on your friendly, neighborhood online auction site. Frankly, I didn’t know what they had, either, or I probably would have offered to may -more- than I did. At the time, I was afraid I was paying too much! I just figured I would splurge, since it was the set!
I guess it really is better to be lucky than good!
TexLaw those inherited and passed down pieces are the best. Sounds like you got a great find on the set. I have most of my Mom’s CI, because I have sisters who don’t like the weight or not being able to put them in a dishwasher. Their loss was my gain. I had a friend that said “you never really die until you end up on the wall at a Cracker Barrel”. There a lot of truth in that statement.
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processhead yep, I can when I get home after work. It needs to be seasoned as my wife’s aunt didn’t take the best care of it. Little bit of surface/flash rust on it.
@ndmike you can sand blast it and reseason it
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I use cast iron on an on going basis from meat loaf pans to 10” & 12” skillets to grill surface and Dutch ovens
You can beat it for heat retention and good flavors
The old stuff has better surfaces for sure
I have a few pieces that are well over a 100 years old and still going strong
I don’t like the enameled stuff at all, why use it?
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The enameled CI works well with acidic foods, chili, spaghetti sauce, etc… If it sits to long it can damage the seasoning and impart a funky flavor to the meal. I have a few pieces to handle those types of meals. We found an old 10in buried on our property that my wife brought back to life. That piece has had constant use at our house. CI will last several lifetimes with proper care. Sounds like I am not the only one that goes checking out places for pieces.
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Enameled also is a good deal easier to clean when stuff sticks or gets baked on. Just scrub away without having to deal with reseasoning or any other such trouble. It’s also slick right from the get-go and doesn’t require special care (other than not banging it around so much that the enameling chips).
But, yeah, the reactivity is the real reason you want enameled. I don’t think I’d want to simmer something acidic in there for a few hours to find that I wished I hadn’t.
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