Okay! I absolutely absolutely love to cook in my cast iron skillets! When I get the skillet going and throw in some bacon and eggs, the smell reminds me of spending time at my Grandma's house. I'm not sure she has ever owned anything but cast iron, and she is the best cook in the world. I have often wondered how she stayed sane all these years cooking 3 square meals a day in cast skillets and then cleaning them everytime?
I believe cooking in cast gives things a different flavor and think it is amazing!
But the down side of cast iron (Or what used to be the downside) is the cleaning of it afterwards. ANyone who has used cast knows that sometimes things stick to it if you're not careful. Especially scrambled eggs!! Why is that? They are cooking along just fine, and you go to stir them and you have like 1/4 of an inch of egg permanently adhered to the bottom of your skillet? My fried eggs don't do this. I believe it is one of life's mysteries!! Anyways, back to the topic of this tip!
Cast skillets are not to be submerged into your dish water as the soap wil take off all that great "seasoning" you have worked so hard to build up on it. (If you need to know how to season a skillet I will post that later.) So you are stuck with scraping, prying, and cussing, trying to get the stick stuff out. Using a scouring pad to chisel out the left over stuff, totally wrecking your beautiful fingernails in the process!! Think my grandpa told me once, to go find some good clean sand and put it in the toe of an old panty hoses and use that to scrub them out???? Okay, that sounds tricky on lots of levels. One where the heck do you find "clean" sand and two, who has panty hose anymore! he he!
Well, that process is gone! No More! Frustration, Aggravation, and ruined nails. I stumbled upon this little gem of a trick somewhere (think an old cookbook) and I believe people have been keeping this as a secret for years! Nobody ever told me this!!
Ready! Here is the oh so simple way to clean your skillet.
Step 1- fill dirty skillet with water. enough to cover the stuff stuck on the bottom, and a little extra. If there is stuff stuck up the sides add a little extra, and cover with a lid.
Step 2 - Bring the water to a full boil for around 2 minutes! May vary depending on how stuck it is. You will see the food begin to float around and break loose.
Step 3- Run under a little water and WIPE OUT STUCK FOOD!!!! ***Remember the skillet is HOT and the water you are pouring out is HOT!! So use a potholder, and be careful!
YEP! That's it! I swear that is a well kept secret.! It works great! I usually put the skillet on to boil while I am loading the dishwasher and wiping down the countertops, and by the time I am done it is ready to wipe out!
Then all your left with doing is using a paper towel to dry any excess water and rubbing a little crisco in it and you have a perfectly cleaned skillet ready for it's next use!
I hope you enjoy this tip! I know I have! Thank you to whoever came up with this.
No comments:
Post a Comment