Restoring Cast Iron, or History Repeats Itself In My Kitchen

Reduce, reuse, recycle. I choose not to question whether my zeal for second-hand goods is a result of wanting to cut down on consumer waste or a direct result of what my Grandma called her "cheap Scotch blood." (Scotch as in Scottish - she'd haunt me if she thought I portrayed her as a boozer.)

Either way, I love a good deal. The majority of the baby goods in my home - from bassinet to swing set, high chair to clothing - have both a previous and future owner. But this is not a blog about Craig's List baby goods. Consider this one giant segue leading you to my newest kitchen obsession.

Cast iron.

I have fallen in love with a #10 Wagner cast iron pan from the early 1900s that my mom found for $10 at a yard sale. (Huge benefit to me that the "granny" of ebay's Granny's Trinkets and Trash is my mom.)  It weighs more than a bowling ball and I have definitely built some arm muscle since I've started cooking with it. There is comfort in the heft though - the feel of a thing that is well made. I like to imagine the three generations of mothers before me using this same pan to feed their families. It has good mojo.

When I first got it though, there was work to be done. Most old cast iron requires some reviving. It was covered in rust and layers of cooked-on grease that the cast iron world technically refers to as "gunk."

Like all innovative DIY newbies, I went online for information on how to restore this beauty. I found that people are CRAZY when it comes to cast iron. I'd find a blog with what I thought to be good information only to be dissuaded by reader comments hundreds deep on why a particular process does or does not result in a perfectly seasoned non-stick pan. For cast iron junkies, the "perfectly seasoned pan" is the elusive holy grail of cookware. So, I read a lot and then decided to wing it.

My salvaging supplies consisted of oven cleaner, protective gear for me and the patio, a few garbage bags, 2 wire brushes originally for stripping paint, vinegar, borax, and those blue soap SOS pads that you can probably find right now corroding in a corner of the cabinet beneath your kitchen sink.

My process consisted of spraying down the pan with oven cleaner, double-bagging it, and letting it sit in the sun for 48 hours before rinsing it off and going to town with the wire brushes in an effort to get the gunk off. It took 4 rounds of this, and a final bit of elbow grease courtesy of my husband, before I got the pan down to its raw iron core. It still looked rusty but it was smooth.

Then I gave it a final scrub with the SOS pad before I soaked it in a 50/50 white vinegar and water bath for about 12 hours. After that I thoroughly cleaned the pan with borax (borrowed from my laundry room - 12 Mule Borax is great for your whites) to neutralize the vinegar.

Time to wipe it off and then pop it into a 200 degree oven for 20 minutes to get it bone dry. Let the seasoning begin! I coated it with a thin layer of organic flax seed oil and put it in a 500 degree oven for an hour, then let it cool in the oven for 2 additional hours, before taking it out and repeating this process. Based on a blog I found, I did this a whopping SIX TIMES. I was about 2 weeks in to this pan at this point, but things were looking pretty good.

I still didn't have that deep dark black that I coveted though, and my first trial with cooking salmon was semi-disastrous. I wanted my friend Julie's pan from The Crankin' Kitchen - she makes amazing food with a jet black pan that was her Grandma's.

Back to the internet, and I stumbled upon the best piece of cast iron advice yet. In essence, a very down-to-earth man, whom I picture to have a slightly shaggy haircut and a handlebar mustache ala Sam Elliott, advised the cast iron world to calm down and take a breath. He told us all to clean our pans with soap (since we'd be re-seasoning), dry them with heat, wipe them down with a good layer of shortening or lard, and throw them into a 300 degree oven for 2-3 hours. Wipe them down once more and then start cooking. He said to break in the pans in with fatty meats (hello bacon friend) and deep fried dishes until they reached a glossy black finish over time. Yep, just like our grandmas did. I would have to slow down, curb my notions of instant gratification, and give my pan some time.

So, I have been frying bacon, chicken cutlets, and these delicious Asian fish cakes to my heart's content.

After dinner I wipe the pan down with a paper towel and leave a light coating of oil from that night's meal. And lo and behold! Little by little, meal by meal, my lovely history-filled pan is turning in to the skillet of my culinary dreams.

Tools of the Trade

How have I just learned about America's Test Kitchen? I am in food nerd love. Not only can I watch their geek-not-quite-chic show on PBS, but for $30 a year I have access to a dozen years of knowledge online.

I can lose hours reading their product reviews, and since I am cooking so much right now I found the following directive on cookware sets to be incredibly useful:

Our ideal set would include a roomy 12-inch traditional skillet (or fry pan—we use the terms interchangeably) that’s big enough to fit four chicken breasts; a 10-inch nonstick skillet for cooking delicate omelets and fish; a 12-inch cast-iron skillet for frying and searing; a 4-quart covered saucepan for vegetables and other side dishes; a 2-quart covered saucepan for heating soup or cooking oatmeal; a 6- or 7-quart enameled cast-iron Dutch oven for braising, deep-frying, and even baking bread; and a large stockpot that can do double-duty for pasta, lobster, or corn on the cob.

This "ideal set" doesn't exist, but I am using this list as a guide to build my own collection one piece at a time. Having the right tools makes any task more enjoyable, especially if it's a task that you love. I'm also a big proponent of buying a quality item and taking care of it rather than buying something cheap and having to replace it every few years.

Quality pieces already in my collection include 10- and 12-inch nonstick skillets (Calphalon for Mother's Day last year - thank you, Jude), a #12 Wagner 10-inch cast-iron skillet with 3-inch sides (100 years old - I'll post soon about restoring this yard sale beauty), a 6-Qt enameled dutch oven (Lodge is a totally functional $55 alternative to the $300 Le Creuset that I covet...), and a 6-inch Le Creuset enameled skillet (not on the list, but incredibly useful for reductions and reheating single servings).

My newest love? A 12-inch traditional skillet by All Clad.

Glorious. Even the packaging was wonderful. I was looking at cheaper stainless steel sets and singles, but ATK gave this their highest rating and I now trust those public access food scientists with all my culinary needs.

As with all things, you get what you pay for. But I do love a deal so I waited to buy this $155 treasure until Macy's had their Friends and Family special. 20% off plus an old $15 store credit and she was all mine for $106 with free shipping. If I were Julie Andrews, and part of me has always wished that I were, I'd be singing to you about three of my favorite things right now - food, quality American-made products, and a sweet sweet bargain.

We christened the pan last night with sea scallops - easily fitting 8 in the pan without crowding them. I didn't take pictures, but here's the fool-proof recipe for melt-in-your-mouth scallops.

As for my lovely pan? Ah, she did just fine.

SIMPLE SCALLOPS

(serves 2)

Ingredients:
8 sea-scallops, cleaned and patted dry
2 Tbsp EVOO
salt and pepper
1/2 C dry white wine
3 Tbsp butter

Preheat your pan over high heat with 2 Tbsp EVOO and 1 Tbsp butter. Liberally salt and pepper your scallops. After butter foam starts to subside, add scallops to the pan and let them cook 2 minutes until they release easily and have a nice dark crust. Cook an additional 1-2 minutes on the second side and then remove to a warm plate where they will continue to cook slightly as they rest. (Do not overcook them - they get tough and gross. I didn't think I liked scallops for years because I had rubbery restaurant scallops the first time I ordered them.)

Deglaze the pan with half a cup of dry white wine - reducing by half while you scrape the nice crusty fond from the bottom of the pan to create a lovely sauce. (I used our go to chardonnay by Cupcake Vineyards. Half cup in the sauce, half bottle in my glass.) Remove sauce from heat and thicken with 2 Tbsp butter.

Spoon pan sauce over scallops. Cry because they are so so good.

Quick and Easy: Salmon filets

I may not have been writing over the past week, but I have been doing. So today we get a flurry of blog activity. If I were some not-so-clever copywriter I'd call it blogtivity, but then I'd hate myself. Don't get me started on why I refuse to eat at Subway and support an establishment that utilizes words like "Febru-any."

But I digress.

I'm starting a new blog category (ugh, blog-egory) dedicated to the working parent called "Quick and Easy." These are delicious "get it on the table fast" foods that you can prepare in less time than it takes to organize your family's order and hit the drive-thru.

We'll kick it off with fool-proof salmon filets courtesy of Ina Garten. I love me some Barefoot Contessa. Thanks to Ina, I will no longer serve overcooked, under-seasoned salmon. I will give my family fish once a week in order to make us all smarter. And since this dish is so wonderful, I will now buy enough for 3 meals since Gabe, Jude and I polished off both the original dinner and the planned leftovers in one swoop. (Win!)

Toddler tip: Jude loves sharks. Sharks eat fish. So we encourage Jude to eat his "shark food" when we serve fish for dinner. Great introduction and now he actually asks for this meal.

PAN-SEARED SALMON FILETS
(on the plate in 15 minutes)

Ingredients:
Salmon
Olive oil
Salt
Pepper


Pre-heat the oven to 400 degrees F.

Heat a dry oven-safe skillet on high heat for 4 minutes. (This would be great in a cast iron skillet.)

Pull your pre-cut salmon filets from the fridge. Remove the skin as it's gross and there is no place for it in this recipe. Rub the filets with EVOO and generously salt and pepper the tops.

Place filets, seasoning side down, into the hot pan and LEAVE THEM ALONE FOR 2 MINUTES! I mean it, don't peak or pull at them.

They are ready to turn over when they release from the pan without sticking and are a deep brown.

Place the pan into the pre-heated oven for 7 minutes. This would be a great time to make a salad or shoot a glass of wine before the family comes to dinner and spoils your buzz. If you want to include your significant other in the alcohol-based love, let me recommend a nice Santa Margherita Pinot Grigio with this meal.

Once you've got your drinks sorted out, remove the pan from the oven and the salmon will be rare to medium rare in the center. This is a tad too raw for my family, so I let the salmon rest in the hot pan for 3 or 4 minutes while I plate the sides. This gives us a perfect medium every time.

Melt in your mouth delicious. Enjoy your dinner.