Deep Dive: How to Season Cast Iron the Right Way (No Myths)
So, how should you be seasoning your cast iron skillet or pan? At what temperature should you be seasoning them? What kind of oil should you be using? And is there anything that you should look out for? In today's video, I want to give you guys a general guide to get you started. Talk over some important things that you should be considering. Also go over some different methods of seasoning cast iron. This also works for carbon steel. And talk about things that you should personally look out for. Let's dive in. [music] Okay, so let's start off with what is seasoning and what are you trying to accomplish? This is really crucial. You have to understand what you're trying to do. It's actually not to get a non-stick surface. That's actually a secondary benefit. When it comes to cast iron and carbon steel, the number one reason you season your pans, the main purpose is to prevent the pans from rust or oxidation, bad oxidation. So, it's a protective layer more than anything else. But because it's highly effective at reducing the chances of getting rust and everyday normal cooking techniques, it also gives you a byproduct of giving you a polymerized surface, which makes it pretty non-stick. And the better that surface gets as you use it, just using it naturally, the more non-stick the pan gets. So that's the number one reason behind seasoning. It's actually not to get a non-stick surface. It's to protect the pots and pans. I also wanted to kind of touch up on another thing. The trend with new pans is they're going to come factory seasoned. Is the factory seasoning any good? Yes [music] and no. So, Lodge, for example, is notorious for giving you factory preseasoning, right? And it's fine. It's actually good. if you wanted to just kind of go with that. I still recommend that you wash the pans, clean them because there could be other stuff from the manufacturing process that you don't necessarily want in your food. But I mean, generally speaking, yeah, if you just went with it and used them and used them properly, you should be fine. And then you're going to create your own seasoning on top of that. There's also seasoning that comes like this. This particular cast iron pan is from Cook Life. I've actually done a full video on this guy and I compared it to Lodge. I do think that these are higher quality. They do offer more. They also come with a mil surface that's perfectly smooth and we'll talk about that. Um, but this is kind of a different process. This is like almost anodized, right? At the price point that you're paying, you would expect something like this. It's actually really, really good. [laughter] So, this is probably the best preseason I've seen on almost any pan. Different types of preseason. Generally speaking, if you don't like the way it looks, visually examine it, sand it off and start over. There's absolutely nothing wrong with doing that. So, let's talk about some preseason techniques that you should be aware of. So, I think there's two main methods. Right now, we're going to talk about the techniques. And in those techniques, I'm going to split them up into the oven method and the stove top method. Within those two techniques, there's actually for the oven method, there's two different ways of doing it. And I'm going to talk about that a little bit later. But first, let me just talk about what those techniques kind of are, right? So, the first one's the most popular, the oven method. Highly recommend it for cast iron in particular because the entire thing is cast iron, including the handle. So, the entire pan or pot is oven safe, which gives you a great opportunity to coat the entire pan in whatever oil you want to use, and we're going to talk about oil a little bit later, and put the entire thing in the oven to give a polymerized coating for the entirety of the pan, which will protect the entire pan. Now, that is probably my preferred method for seasoning cast iron. Not only is it highly effective at protecting the pan, but it's also really easy to do, and it's almost set it and forget it. I mean, just use a timer or something to remind you, and you should be good to go. You want to use oil that is better at palmerizing than other oils. Preferably, I am a firm believer in using high smoke point oil. Now, not super high. You don't have to go out and buy avocado oil that has a smoke point of 5 like 50 degrees that cost you like $50, you know, a liter. I don't know, right? Like, you don't need to do that. But, you know, I like using like grape seed oil or sunflower seed oil, something that has a fairly high smoke point, 400, 450°, something like that. And then you basically coat a very thin layer and you just get some oil with a paper towel, rub it all around the pan. And then you want to stick the pan inside of the oven. Now, I told you that there's two different methods, and there is. Like anything else in cooking, everything is a factor of both temperature and time. You can palmerize oil in two di
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