Let me tell you, if you’re not cooking with cast iron you’re missing out! For years I was intrigued by cast iron but the care and seasoning process intimidated me. It seemed strange and unsanitary that you didn’t use soap to clean it. It also seemed like a pain in the neck to have to go through all of those steps each time I used it.
But after a while, curiosity got the best of me, and I asked for a cast iron pan for Christmas.
After a bit of research, I’ve found that caring for cast iron is really no big deal. It takes less time and effort than cleaning my juicer. (My least favorite kitchen gadget to clean) And the cooking payoff WAAAY out-weighs the care required.
Benefits of cast iron
- It’s all about the sear. Cast iron sears the exterior of food into a crispy, crunchy, caramelly crust and it’s amazing! Steak gets this amazing sizzled browning that is out of this world! Fried potatoes … don’t get me started!
- It cooks evenly. The heat distribution travels uniformly across the entire pan surface so you don’t get hot and cool spots.
- It has a fairly non-stick cooking surface without the use of Teflon or other possibly toxic technologies.
- You can move from stovetop to oven with ease.
- You can crowd the pan and still get crispy food.
Caring for cast iron
The enemy of cast iron is water. Really that’s the logic behind the seasoning process. The seasoning process heats the pan to remove any water that may have penetrated into the porous surface of the cast iron. Then it is sealed with an oil as a protective layer.
You can wash your cast iron with soap, but soap will remove the protective oil. So you’ll have to repeat the seasoning process.
Why beeswax?
Most of the time seasoning is done with a room temperature solid oil. I like to use rendered lard, but vegetable shortening or coconut oil works well too. An oil with a high smoke point is best.
Seasoning with beeswax works especially well if you plan to store cast iron for a period of time. The wax also holds up better if you do have to use soap.
Beeswax is a great waterproofer. It’s also completely edible and natural. Beeswax hardens better at room temperature than oils so you won’t get that sticky residue that sometimes happens with oil. Beeswax has the slightest honey flavor which may be detectable if you’re cooking something without a lot of flavors right after you season your pan. But, with most food it’s undetectable and will disappear after the first round of cooking.
Seasoning your pan with beeswax
Clean the pan with salt and a stiff brush, steel wool or soap and water. Rinse well with hot water. Dry thoroughly with a towel.- Place the pan on the stove top. I let it heat up a bit to get out any extra water.
- Then sprinkle in some beeswax. I’m using pelleted here, but if you have a brick, just melt enough so you can spread it around.
Use a paper towel to distribute the wax all over the pan. The bottom too.- Place it in a 400-degree oven for around 30 minutes to an hour. You may get some smoking as the wax is burned off so an overhead exhaust fan works well.
- Check the pan after 30 minutes you want most of the wax gone and a dry-shiny appearance to the pan.
7 Comments
LOVE cast iron pans ~ we have several different sizes, as it’s the only thing we cook with now. This time of year (November and December) our dutch oven gets a lot of use for making soups 😉
Wondering about sealing an old cast iron stove
I used to be put off by the no-soap thing, but then read an article that pointed out the fact that you’re heating the pan to a high temp every time you use it, so if there were any “germs” that remained after your soapless cleaning, the heat would kill them.
A well seasoned pan (lightly oiled and cooked on at a high temp) won’t be ruined by occasional soap use. I’ve done all of mine with flax oil. The coating of oil needs to be very thin before putting in the oven or you’ll get the sticky drips.
Also, while cast iron has some great advantages, even heating isn’t really one of them. On a gas stove burner, there are definitely hot spots where the flame hits the skillet.
I clean my cast iron with chain maille. Sold in specialty cooking shops, it scrapes all food residue from the surface without hurting the coating. Plus, it looks cool hanging next to my sink like a metal dishrag.
Thanks! I love my cast iron pans that were passed down to me from my Mom. My husband takes care of the bees, and I the cast iron pans. Now I can use bees wax to seal them after I clean them!
You are incorrect. Cast iron does not cook evenly. Heat does not distribute evenly through iron. Cast iron retains heat well. But this also means that it’s not as responsive to changes in the heat of the element as other metals. Again: cast iron = good retention, poor distribution. Please properly research and source your claims.
Cast iron does not cook evenly at all. It is a poor conductor of heat. It simply has high thermal mass.