Well seasoning isn’t really the brown stuff we try to clean off other pans. It’s the black stuff it’ll turn into if we don’t.
And if you’ve ever tried to get that off something you don’t want it on. You’re going with oven cleaner. Even sand paper and paint scrapers don’t do much more than chip away at it.
I don’t really see the point in a chainmail scrubber. Scrubby sponges and brushes work fine. Things don’t really attach themselves that tenaciously to a well seasoned pan.
Foodsguy is being needlessly pedantic and harping on a distinction that doesn’t exist.
Dictionaries disagree too.
I think the actual difference here is US vs UK usage.
It really is. The brown stuff that is so hard to get off is polymerized oil, which is “seasoning”. It may lack carbonization at this point but it is still seasoning.
Whether slotted or not, for me having the flat end made of flexible spring steel is critical for getting it under pancakes, eggs, etc if the sides of the pan have any height at all. But for some reason these are getting harder to find those days.
Ah, yes, I seem to remember hearing about that. I usually just use kosher salt, or maybe a plastic scrubby, but my seasoning doesn’t seem to hold on to much. Makes sense it wouldn’t really be affected by metal tools.
Drying oils like flax/linseed will polymerize into a hard coating without applying heat. We wouldn’t really call such a coating on metal a “seasoning”. Kinda the key thing is the level and type of polymerization. The brown, partially cooked down film tends to cause things to stick and comes off quite a bit easier.
It’s one of the key mistakes people make seasoning pans, just not heating things up enough or for long enough.
To a certain extent it’s kinda just semantics whether you want to call that seasoning or not. But the salient thing is that a properly seasoned pan, the black coating is significantly more durable than the brown stuff. Whether it’s on cast iron or not.
their amazon store doesn’t mention the abroad manufacturing though.
