It does not have to smoke. Just use a temp right below the smoke point of your oil. I use corn oil and 400F; corn oil smokes at 450F. If you want to use flax oil, try going with 375F or so, as flax oil smokes at 400F.
I prefer not to season my skillet upside down. I find that, if I do that, sometimes the oil will pool in little drips that get solid before I spot them and wipe them away. If I put it right side up, I can peep and see the oil pooling and get it with a paper toil before it “sets.”
NB: of course I’m talking about an oven in the kitchen, not a grill.
Ditto. Hot water and salt is all it takes. I just like to minimize the how often I have to season it outside of cooking with it. Which I realize might seem strange given my extensive re-seasoning ritual. Set it and forget it is my goal.
The internet might be full of people who leave tomato sauce in the pan, stack things on top of it, and forget about it for at least a week. That calls for a reseason, but please don’t ask me how I know.
I have more cast iron pans, large, small, round square, flat, tall, bacon press and a giant cast iron dutch oven (you know, for backpacking) than I have conventional modern alloy pans of any description. A neighbor gave me a maybe 10-20 year old cast iron pan w a bit of rust on it. He’s afraid to season it… oh my! I have the cast iron pan from my mom’s house that I went away to college with. Sending it off w Enkling the Elder for 3rd year of college. And the cycle is renewed.
Also, keep all soaps away from cast iron. A square of stainless steel chainmail makes for a very fine scraper with a bit of hot water or perhaps some rock salt. Gently now, like a lover’s kiss… yes.
It pays to reseason every once and a while as preventative maintenance. But I live somewhere agressively humid with salty air. And with people who like to soak the cast iron instead of washing it.
Saturated/solid fats are the old school answer. But like the problem with Flax revealed themselves over time side by side testing vs oil has shown solid fats are more prone to gunky buildup, and that chunky carbon on the exterior of the pan.
That’s less of a problem than flaking though. And its often a very good solution if you’re having an issue. To the point where “cook bacon in it” is a pretty good stock response to where did I go wrong type questions.
Some oils seem to turn brittle and flake off. If you keep using the pan it will work itself out. Cast iron seems to benefit if you use it every day. Consider adding more bacon to your diet.
I’ve seasoned new or restored pans with vegetable oil, olive oil, corn oil, lard, and shortening. Putting on too much in one go seems to make a rubbery layer that peels up. Not using enough heat with the lard or shortening also seemed to not season up as well. All the vegetable oils made a very thin slick seasoning, if perhaps a little brittle.
People love their froufrou cleaning methods — apologies to those in this group with ancestral chainmaille and Himalayan sea salts — but the proof is in the pudding-pan. I have two cast iron pans that I use every single day, and scrub with dish soap every day, like I would any other pan, and they’re perfectly smooth and perfectly perfect.
(And it’s not just because I use them every day. My third is used once a week at most, for pancakes on weekends, and it’s just as good.)
Sound is the key, if you just hear a dead thud then you might indeed be holding it wrong, but if it gives a good “whang-ing” noise then you’ve surely got it!
There is a similar one for thermometers: If you own just one thermometer you will always know what the temperature is. If you have two thermometers you will never know the temperature.
