Non-Stick Skillet

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DADoES

DADoES

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Having become thoroughly miffed at the typical non-stick skillet offerings (coatings nick and flake even when used only with a wooden spoon and handwashing, thin material warps under heat, etc.), I splurged this afternoon on a Zwilling J.A. Henckels Spirit-line stainless steel ceramic-coated 12" specimen, bought at a local kitchen products store.  They also carry Swiss Diamond but I was leery of the shallow profile.

Anyone have comments and/or first-hand experience with Zwilling Spirit?  It's labeled dishwasher safe but does it really hold up well?  The salesgirl advised/agreed handwashing is less risk.
 
Sorry, no comment on the particular brand you bought because I've got no experience with it whatsoever. By which I mean, of course, pots and pans -- their knives are excellent and I'd expect their other products to be at least as good.

That having been said, I have a few pots/pans by Bialetti (with the "ceramic" non-stick) that specifically say they should not be machine washed, they are about 4 years old and have not been hand washed, always go in the dishwasher and they are OK.

The Circulon pots/pans are a more traditional non-stick and seem to be doing well too, also always washed by machine.

I've noticed that teflon-like materials started lasting longer in my home after the dishwasher detergents dropped chlorine bleach and went with enzymes. No scientific explanation, in fact that is just another anecdotal evidence thing, and until way more research and serious scientific research gets done, we won't know.

The other thing we seem to do differently in my home is we *never* follow the cooking instructions to put an empty pot/pan on the burner to pre-heat for any extended length of time whatsoever.

In our home, if the burner is on, the pot/pan has at least some water, butter or oil in it to limit the temperature the pot can reach and also give some visual indication of how hot it is. I can't understand instructions to preheat for several minutes when less than one minute gets the pots over 400F. Teflon and other non-stick materials get a "continuous duty" of about 400-450F (depending on specific formulas etc) and start to degrade very quickly once it gets to 500-550F. Anyone with one of those "laser" infra-red thermometers can tell you it doesn't take very long for an empty pot to reach those temps and ruin the coating.

Good luck!
 
No, I use my ancient cast iron skillets and none of those new fangled pans. Finish your cooking, fill with hot water, let soak and take a nylon scubbie to it. Nothing peels off and very little ever sticks. Not interested in that loudmouth hawking her copper crap pans, but wait, theres more. I dont think so and I dont want 2 (just pay a handling fee). NOPE
 
RE ancient cast iron

is the ONLY cast iron, this new Lodge stuff isn't worth carrying home, all mine is old and smooth on the inside, mostly Griswold and Wagner, Lodge is rough on the inside.
 
Honestly, if I was going to buy non stick cookware, I'd look at the green/copper/ceramic/flavor of the week/as seen on TV. I've used the green pan nonstick, along with the copper version, and they do work as well as they claim to. NOTHING sticks. Not even eggs with melted cheese. I can't say a lot for durability since I don't own them, but my Grandma has one of the green pans and loves it, it does have some minor scratches but she uses metal utensils. My Girlfriend's Mom has a full set of the copper nonstick and loves them, hers are fairly new though. I don't usually follow the newest and greatest as seen on TV products, but these have some promise, at least the way I see it. I don't particularly care for nonstick otherwise, I tend to use metal utensils without even thinking and have scraped off some pretty good pieces. Or used a mixer to mash potatoes and after mashing thought... Hmm, I don't remember adding black pepper... Give me stainless or aluminum any day.
 
I just recently purchased several pieces of cookware from All-Clad and two of them are the ceramic nonstick skillets and they have been excellent so far.

Also have a large cast iron skillet that I hardly use simply because it is heavy and unwieldy, but sometimes I want that good sear that cast iron gives. Also love my Le Cruiset Dutch oven. Now that the cooler weather is coming it will get plenty of use.
 
We have an old GE electric skillet, and a West Bend Country Kettle, both w/ the 1st generation of Teflon.  It's very durable, and cleans up like a dream.  Today's stuff seems to be barely there at all. 
 
PTFE coatings

are not for life. Wear, and high heat above 375 f. breaks it down, and I had a T-Fal set in the 90's I out in the dishwasher, and it eventually wore off.
I have not had a ceramic non stick pan yet.
I bought two Calphalon black anodized pans because they were a deep discount. I use silicon tools on them.
I have one stainless steel ordinary Scan Pan from Sur Le Table' made in Denmark for searing, or I use my enameled cast iron dutch oven. Nice gift card from last Christmas.
 
I have an All-Clad stainless steel omelet pan with non-stick ceramic coating. Performance is superb. I hand wash it, to protect the ceramic coating. Most of my cookware is Cuisinart Stainless Multiclad-Pro and all of it goes in the dishwasher. Multicolor hard water spots, which develop in time when pans are washed in the DW, are easily removed with a wet cloth and Barkeeper's Friend.

I also have two pans from Staub (10" skillet, 12" grill pan) which are cast iron with enamel coating, and the interior of the pans is ceramic. Not as nonstick as the omelet pan, but I season with a bit of oil and ramp up the heat very slowly, as it's cast iron. sometimes the pans require soaking in hot sudsy water after they cool.
 
I have 2 to 3 pieces of cast iron and use them for searing, frying (which is almost never).  Oth3erwise I have my Cuisinart Multi-Clad Pro, like Jim, which I got last May with my new induction range.  My biggest concern was scrambled eggs.  After researching online I discovered the proper way to scramble eggs with SS.  And it worked.  When I put the eggs on a plate, the pan was almost perfectly clean.  Even I was amazed.  But I use my cast iron skillets for frying turkey burgers, pancakes, grilled cheese sandwiches.   
 
I've not used that brand either. I had a Macy's brand nonstick set for about 6 years and it held up pretty well. Always washed in the dishwasher.

Last Christmas I bought an All Clad 11" stainless nonstick french skillet and it's an awesome pan. Somehow I missed where it said not to put it in the dishwasher (oops). So after a couple of months the nonstick coating was literally peeling off. Being the great company they are, All Clad replaced it free of charge.
 
Without knowing that brand

At home, we had a huge 28cm Silit deep pan and a 26cm flatter WMF skillet type pan, both with dark ceramic coatings.

Both were in basicly daily use on a cheap induction cooker from Ikea. Washed by hand with hot soapy water and some concentrated vinegar. Every o so often if something was burned in, we used a DW tablet in them and boiled that up with some water.

The non-stick effect worked pretty damn well on both for something like 3 or 4 years. Then the once shiny surface begann to dull and first the bigger one (which was used more), then the smaller one lost their non-stick propertys.

They are still in use as the coating dosen't flake of like in teflon pans, but you now have to use a considerable amount of oil to keep things from sticking.
Overall really nice pans, but they are not eternal.
 
I have a few pieces of "throw-away" pans, with non-stick coatings, for eggs,and such. One is a Everware ceramic fry pan. I have had it about 10 years, I do always hand wash, use plastic or wooden utensils and am careful not to overheat.

That pan is just now starting to stick, but only in the middle. I am just aware when I buy a non-stick that it won't be an heirloom, and will more than likely find it's way to the aluminum recycle plant, or break the handle off and it becomes the dog's outdoor water pan after a few years of usage.

I have Calphalon Three ply stainless for my other cooking. I do have some good cast iron, but don't use on my smooth top, but do use it on the induction portable burner. Also can't beat a cast iron skillet for cornbread.
 
I have a Cuisinart 10” non stick skillet that I bought at Linens and Things over 20 years ago. I use it primarily for omelets, but I also glaze carrots in it and sauté mushrooms. It sometimes goes in the dishwasher, and the finish looks used, but it isn’t abraded and it still doesn’t stick and makes a great omelet. My other frying pans are a covered 10” Farberware, also 20 years old, a 10” cast iron pan that I inherited when I moved into an apartment in 1972 and the former tenant left it for me, it is the best of all of them and a 12” Lodge cast iron frying pan about 15 yrs old.

My pans are like old friends, I know just what they can and can’t do well and combined they met all my culinary requirements. You don’t have to spend a lot of money to have perfectly fine and functional cookware.
Eddie
 
I have a Cuisinart 10” non stick skillet that I bought at Linens and Things over 20 years ago. I use it primarily for omelets, but I also glaze carrots in it and sauté mushrooms. It sometimes goes in the dishwasher, and the finish looks used, but it isn’t abraded and it still doesn’t stick and makes a great omelet. My other frying pans are a covered 10” Farberware, also 20 years old, a 10” cast iron pan that I inherited when I moved into an apartment in 1972 and the former tenant left it for me, it is the best of all of them and a 12” Lodge cast iron frying pan about 15 yrs old.

My pans are like old friends, I know just what they can and can’t do well and combined they met all my culinary requirements. You don’t have to spend a lot of money to have perfectly fine and functional cookware.
Eddie
 
IMO there's no point...

in buying any pricey non-stick pan, no matter the brand they all start to wear out after a couple of years. We buy WINCO commercial non-stick pans in 8", 10" and 12" sizes. Built for commercial use, they perform very well, cost $10-14 each, then get re-cycled when they start to lose their mojo, which all pans will eventually. Otherwise we use our Lustre-Craft (hi-end Wear-Ever, lifetime guarantee) set that we bought in 1971, or occasionally a well seasoned cast iron Wagner pan, but we rarely use that anymore as the non-stick pans work so much better for most tasks.
 
T-Fal

The Opti-Cook with the red thermo-spot in the middle. My first one lasted for years and went through the d/w hundreds of times. It never did start losing its coating, but a little less slick than when new, so I replaced it about a year ago. It's the large one for about $65 on Amazon and it has a glass lid and straight, tall sides almost like my old Magnalite chicken fryer (whatever happened to chicken fryer pans?). I have s.s. for the few pots I keep. I own an Instant Pot (I-Pot) which has a s.s. insert and heavy bottom suitable for cooking on my range, and I've deep fried in it on occasion and of course sear in it. Plus, I own a half dozen stovetop pc's sized from 1.5L to 22L, and the two All-American canners which are very suitable for pc-ing very large quantities.

I made a big pan of Velveeta/Ro-Tel cheese dip the other day on the spur of the moment for some unexpected guests for card playing. This big T-Fal is great for that: just dump 3 cans of Ro-Tels in, tear up a big brick of Velveeta in there, and put on low with the glass lid on. Without this, I'd have nuked it all and had to do several rounds with stirring and it'd probably still foam up.

I agree with Pepin, every kitchen needs one non-stick pan for eggs. I really don't like cast iron; the concept of not cleaning with soapy water has never appealed to me, and I prefer my cornbread in an 8x8 Pyrex, with my own fresh-ground cornmeal.
 

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