[vaylian]

Thank you for doing this. The conclusion from the text is:

> For consumers who wish to minimize potential exposure to PTFE coating particles, the simplest approach may be to treat nonstick cookware as a specialized tool rather than a default choice. Instead, reach for uncoated cookware, such as stainless steel, cast iron, carbon steel, or glass, whenever practical.

If we follow that advice: For which type of food/dishes does it make sense to use nonstick cookware?

[stult]

I stopped cooking with nonstick pans over 15 years ago, and the only thing I've found that can consistently be a bit tricky is eggs, but really only if the pan isn't hot enough yet when you add the butter or oil, you don't use enough butter/oil, you try to scramble the eggs in the pan, or you try to lift the eggs too soon. So arguably it takes a little more attention to detail to cook eggs on stainless steel, but in general I really don't think there is anything that requires nonstick. But even for the limited list of items that are easier to prepare on nonstick, it's usually just a matter of learning how to adjust your technique to match the cookware.

I made the switch to stainless steel and cast iron pretty much on a whim after I first read about Robert Bilott's lawsuits against DuPont, at which point I discovered it made almost no difference to my quality of life at all to avoid nonstick. To such an extent that I have never been even slightly tempted to switch back, despite honestly not feeling a particularly strong motivation to avoid nonstick in the first place. I've just always figured cooking with steel is an entirely painless way to reduce my potential exposure to dangerous chemicals, so even if it ends up being pointless, I haven't lost anything of value anyway.

[Freedumbs]

Eggs stick if the pan temperature isn't right or if there's not enough lube. User error or skill issue. Here's how to do it: buy good pans, turn on pan to ~medium, add oil and rub in with cloth, add more oil (or butter, butter is better with eggs), when pan is hot add eggs. This works with good quality (all clad) or heavy (cast iron) pans.

[KetoManx64]

> Add oil and rub in with cloth

Do what now?

[dzhiurgis]

Personal opinion - deep fried eggs are goated. It's either runny scrambled (pretty hard on cast iron/stainless) or deep fried. Anything in-between is incompetence.

[SAI_Peregrinus]

Runny scrambled (French omelet) isn't too bad on carbon steel IME. And certainly possible on cast iron, since that was the type of pan used when Carême wrote his cookbook. By Escoffier's time carbon steel was more common. Neither of them is famous for having invented a time machine, both predate non-stick cookware, and they're the most famous French chefs in history.

[dzhiurgis]

French omelet is completely different thing. I do use my cast iron for this, it's okay if you go hard with silicone spatula. But still, more work than nonstick. I keep meaning to get carbon steel!

[SAI_Peregrinus]

By "runny scrambled" I mean a folded omelette with a runny center, just-set exterior, and no browning. Classic French style, not just slop on a plate.

[milch]

My wife and I started doing this about 5 years ago or so. Since then, we gradually acquired more carbon steel, stainless steel, cast iron, and enameled cookware. Initially we were reaching for the non-stick for all the typical reasons, e.g. making eggs, but over time we found ourselves reaching for the non-stick less and less. It turns out that the "seasoning" on the cast iron and carbon steel improves their non-stick properties over time, which at this point is good-enough for anything... I can cook eggs, pancakes, a piece of salmon without breaking the delicate skin or shredding the fish, and so on. As I see it, non-stick pans have two benefits: they require less maintenance (you can stack them in the sink and deal with them whenever, which you shouldn't with uncoated metal pans after cooking anything liquid/acidic) and you can cook more easily without using any fat. For us, neither matter much, so about 2 years or so ago when our last non-stick pan needed to be replaced we decided not to get a new one and just get rid of it.

[Izkata]

I got a stainless steel skillet out of curiosity after yet another painful experience with nonstick: Bacon grease sticks very well to nonstick and can be almost impossible to clean off. Picked stainless steel after reading about the different types because it seemed to take the least effort to handle and last the longest, turned out really easy to clean after bacon/sausage as well.

[xtiansimon]

Eggs. Chef says don’t touch my omelet pan on pain of death.

[formerly_proven]

Anything that's high in protein, and you don't want to brown appreciably or use much fat. So mostly french omelette and pancakes. The upside is that these also require basically no tool manipulation in the pan and are low heat anyway and probably not something you're daily driving.

[dzhiurgis]

> specialized tool

Thing is, I don't even have need for this tool. Other for perfect scrambled eggs (creamy french style, that nobody really appreciates so it's a moot) I don't have a need for it.

Especially if you upgrade to induction, cast iron + stainless are absolute goats. They are indestructible and zero maintenance. Non brainer.

My conclusion for teflon pans existence is the shitty electric cooktops. Replace them with induction. It costs like $400-600 if it's in built in (idk why US are so reluctant on built-in one). Your existing electrical line probably can support it. It's a 15 minute DIY job.

[SAI_Peregrinus]

I do French-style omelets in a carbon steel pan, on an electric cooktop. Mine's an 8.5" omelet pan, perfect for two egg omelets. I treat it a lot like a wok: heat up until a bit of water dropped in shows the Leidenfrost effect, dump out the water, dump in oil, let it smoke for a few seconds, dump out the oil, then reduce heat, add butter, and drop in the (pre-scrambled & strained) eggs & start mixing while moving the pan back & forth. As the eggs start cooking through, begin rolling by folding up the side & back over, once fully rolled slide onto plate.

This takes practice. I made an omelet a day for a bit over a month to get it to the point I could make one perfect every time. The first few were garbage, after about a week I got a decent result, and the rest was just refining my heat control to get it correct reliably.

[dfxm12]

I think the advice is to avoid using it as a daily driver. If you only have nonstick and carbon steel pans, you might not want to cook something acidic in the carbon steel as it will kill the seasoning. If you have nonstick and stainless steel, you can use the SS for that.

On the otherhand, cooking eggs in nonstick might be easier/require less fat than working with stainless steel.

Nonstick also generally has a lower rated max temp, so avoid using it in the broiler...

All this is to say, it's a trade-off for convenience. With the right technique, or if you want to spend time to rebuild seasoning, you can pretty much use whatever pans you want to cook whatever you want. These types of non-stick pans are relatively new in the world of cooking.

[stronglikedan]

> cooking eggs in nonstick might be easier/require less fat

I don't understand why anyone would want to cook eggs with less fat to begin with.

[kccqzy]

The usual health reasons I guess. And when I cook eggs in butter, most of the butter is discarded; I guess some could perceive this as wasteful.

[nvme0n1p1]

Maybe you could use less butter? When I cook eggs, the butter is basically all absorbed by the end. It took a few tries to dial in the perfect amount though.

[et-al]

I can cook an over-easy egg with less than a teaspoon of oil on a non-stick.

If I do it on cast-iron, it's easily twice that. That adds up to a lot of oil being throw away in a year. And while I love butter on bread, I don't want the taste of it with my eggs.