VIDEO: Pots & Pans
TRANSCRIPT
Hi everybody and welcome to my new series all about things that you need in your kitchen. I'm calling it the Essential Workers… of Your Kitchen series. So let's get started.
Today we're going to talk all about pots and pans. I actually don't have that many pots and pans. I still have a fair bit, but maybe not as many as you would think. They really only fall into three categories.
First and foremost, the OG, stainless steel cookware. These are All-Clad. I registered for them for my wedding and my amazing in-laws bought us an entire set. That was like nine years ago. I don't intend on ever getting new pans. They are dirty, they look gross. My father-in-law cleans them sometimes when he comes here. I don't really care if they're super dirty. I give them a nice scrub. I actually use this little piece of plastic, you can get them on Amazon, and if you have stuck food it just scrapes it off perfectly. I've never really had any issues. I would recommend getting one [skillet] with sloped sides and one with straight up-and-down sides. I actually have two of each. This is my bigger one for sloped sides and this is my smaller one for straight up-and-down sides. But if you just wanted to start with two these are kind of good in between sizes. So that's going to be your skillets. You also need pots for boiling water, making sauces, soups, that sort of thing. Again, these are All-Clad. They're going to last me forever. These things are heavy-duty. The stainless steel holds heat really well so you get a nice even cook the whole time you're cooking. I have four sizes – I have a teeny one, this is kind of the middle size, I've got a really big guy if I'm making a whole box of pasta. But this is probably the size that I would recommend if you're only going to be able to get one. This is kind of your in-between size. I like the long handle, you can also get them with just the two small handles. You could also consider getting a big stockpot – a big stainless-steel stockpot. To be honest we don't get that much use out of our stock pots, but it’s worth having one big guy if you can. So that's stainless steel cookware, that's what we use every single day. I can't even think of a day when we use none of our stainless steel cookware.
Another one that we use pretty often is cast iron. I do not work out guys, this is very heavy. Cast iron is awesome. If you properly season it, it basically becomes your nonstick pan. So if you love nonstick pants and you've been having a hard time breaking up with them, cast iron is the way to go. Non-stick pans are made from Teflon, or there is a newer version, nonetheless it is a toxic chemical. It's toxic to you, it's also very toxic to the workers that make them. There's been some really horrible health outcomes for the workers working in these Teflon plants. Get rid of your non-stick pans, I beg of you. Switch to cast iron. I can definitely show you how to season it – I actually have a whole blog post on it. It's not hard to care for and then it basically becomes nonstick. We cook fried eggs in here, we cook a lot of meat in here, all sorts of good uses for a cast iron. We even make some breads and frittatas and things like that in here. So get yourself a cast iron. I would say this is kind of a good medium size. We also have a smaller one we even have a cast iron wok, but I would start with this.
Last but not least, definitely worth having, probably doesn't get as much use in my kitchen but I'm very glad I have it is enameled cast iron. These things are so heavy. Ok so it is cast iron but it has this paint on it and it always comes with a lid, or it usually does. This is a Dutch oven. I know it looks so dirty you guys, I just don't clean my pans that well, I just don't care. There's no actual debris, it's just a smooth surface. It's not as nonstick as a regular cast iron but it's close. It's great for making soups and stews. It's also great for baking bread because when you put the lid on it forms almost like a steam oven, which a bakery would have but you at home don't, so this is kind of a makeshift steam oven. I have a couple sizes. This is my little guy, I also have a really, really big guy. I would say a medium size is the place to start. This is an off-brand, I think it's actually Mario Batali's old brand. I think I bought this 13 years ago. Le Creuset is the famous brand for enameled cast iron. This is a Le Creuset. To be perfectly honest I haven't really noticed performance differences but Le Creusets are really beautiful and they have some really beautiful paint colors, so I would probably go there. But honestly, again, off-brand still a really solid pot. I've had it for well over a decade.
So that's basically it, those are the three types of pan pots and pans that I recommend you have in your kitchen: stainless steel, cast iron, and enameled cast iron, specifically the Dutch oven type pan.
Hopefully that's helpful. Have a good one!