Whoops....

[Fay Jai]

So....

I was cooking up some salmon the other night in my All Clad Stainless pan. Heating up the oil, heating elemnt is starting to get red, and all of a sudden it sounds like I am welding, there is this HUGE flash of white light, and something starts smoking. I grab the pan, (stupid, in hindsight) and move it to another burner. My stove coil has a hole in it, like it just melted away.

First question: What the hell caused it?

Washing the pan later, I notice that there is what looks like some of the elemnet bonded (melted?) to the bottom of the pan.

Second Question: How can I remove it, (I'm thinkink a fair amount of time with an SOS pad, but a hoing there is another solution,) and is the pan messed up?

Thanks for any advice/input.

~Jason

[ChefCrash]

Well, your heating element is shot and needs to be changed. This happens when the insulation between the inner resistance coil and the outer casing of the heating element disintegrates allowing the two to touch. That shorts the circuit causing arcing (much like welding).

You'l need to gently file the burr off the pan with a metal file. Try not to file the pan itself.