Making Your Stainless Stickless

I am admittedly a bit of a tool snob. Though I despise useless gadgets I do love to have quality tools that make a job easier. Over the years I’ve discovered, as you probably have, that sometimes great names make great products and sometimes smaller lesser known companies do just as well or better.

When Steve and I first married he had an inexpensive set of stainless steel pans that I absolutely hated. Hated. Everything stuck to them, especially meat, and I ruined a fair number of dishes before resorting to a non-stick set. But Teflon has its drawbacks, one of which is its toxicity, so a few years back I treated myself to a few All-Clad pans – on ebay. I went for a large sauté pan and also a large dutch oven. Though I like them I’ve never been in love with them, until now.

Recently I discovered Rouxbe, a cool online cooking school out of Vancouver. Although I wasn’t really looking for a cooking course they have a free 7 day trial so I signed up to see if maybe I needed a cooking course and didn’t know it. 

I love to learn and always figure if I can get one great tip out of a course, especially a trial, I’m pretty happy. Score. I learned a few things even just with the 7 day trial. 

One of the best, and most fun, takeaways from the course was how to properly pre-heat a stainless steel pan. Turns out that if your stainless steel pan is properly heated, food is much less likely to stick. If you properly preheat, then are patient and allow your meat to brown and release from the pan, you’ll end up with nicely browned food, yummy caramelized brown bits (called sucs or fond) for a pan sauce, and a pan that is a dream to clean. Score again!

So what’s the trick?

 

Put your dry pan over your heat source on med-high. Wait a few minutes, then place your hand above (not on!) the pan to see if the heat is radiating through the pan. 

Once you can feel the heat drop just a few drops of water into the pan. 

Does it do this? Not ready.

Wipe the pan dry and try again in a minute or so.

Does it do this? Still not ready.

Wipe again, try again.

Don’t wait too long because in just a few more seconds some kind of cool science magic happens and the water will begin to ball up, like mercury did when we played with it in our hands as kids (!) When your water drop immediately comes together into one bead or several larger beads,  and rolls over the surface of the pan, it is ready for use.

Wipe your pan dry, turn the heat down just a bit and add your chosen oil. Tip your pan quickly to spread the oil (you may see just a hint of smoke) and carefully place your food into your pan. Give your food enough room to breathe, especially if you are wanting to brown meat, and give it enough time to actually brown. Once that happens the meat will release easily from the pan. Like this:

While cooking, watch your heat and adjust as needed. You want the pan hot enough to be sizzling and browning your food, but not so hot that the sucs burn in the pan. If they burn you can’t deglaze your pan to make a flavourful pan sauce.

Does this look familiar? If you aren’t patient and don’t let your food cook until it is ready to release, it’s guaranteed to stick no matter how well you’ve prepared. If you are worried about burning, reduce your heat just a bit and be patient.

Listen, maybe I’m the only home cook on earth who did not know this trick but for me it’s been a revelation. I’ve even purchased another, cheaper stainless steel pan. One step closer to ditching the Teflon forever.