French steel / black metal / carbon steel

[Fat Guy]

It seems that in discussions with home cooks about pots-'n'-pans there is one big missing category: French steel a/k/a black metal a/k/a carbon steel. This is closer to cast-iron in terms of its composition (someone who knows metals can explain the exact spectrum from cast-iron to carbon steel to stainless steel) and how you season and maintain it, but the pieces are not cast and therefore are lighter, quicker to heat, and more like stainless utensils in terms of their shapes and handle designs. I think it's the same category of steel that woks are made out of, to give a reference point for those unfamiliar with the stuff.

These things are dirt cheap, perform beautifully, and are prevalent in restaurant kitchens. So why don't we see more of them in home kitchens? If you can handle cast-iron you can certainly handle these, and they can save you a lot of money.

[Stone]

They don't seem that cheap.

[Fat Guy]

That's top of the line stuff they're selling at Prince, probably handmade. You should be able to get the garden variety in the $20-$30 range. Here's are some sources that came up on Google:

http://www.widerview.com/castindx.html

http://gasparykitchenproducts.com/steelpans.html

http://worldcuisineonline.com/steelpans.htm

I think I routinely see them for less than any of the above prices, however, at the Bowery kitchen supply places.

[Steve Martin]

They are great value. I have a large frying pan from a catering supplier. They call them black iron, though they are carbon steel and go black with use.

The instructions say not to use too much heat, but I thought I knew better and heated it wok style. It now looks like I have been beating someone over the head with it.

So I would say cast iron for the really hot work or maybe keep beating it flat.

PS. Could "French" be the world's most overused adjective.

[Fat Guy]

There must be a big quality spread, because I've never had that problem with mine and I've seen them take a serious beating in restaurant kitchens over flames that none of us can approach with our home ranges.

[Brad S]

These are an excellent all purpose saute pans

When seasoned they work like a charm.

If your pan buckles on you then the gauging is very bad.

You simply can't work a restaurant line with cast iron as you can with carbon steel.

Very light (very important when the saute station is buried) and the pot washers love em!

Much easier to clean (when not seasoned ofcourse)

[Fat Guy]

I made a few calls and learned that many of the carbon steel skillets in wide use in restaurant kitchens here (New York, and probably the USA in general) are made by a company called Vollrath out of Sheboygan, WI. The Vollrath Web site doesn't contain any information on this product specifically (though there's a registered-user-only area that I'll try to get into if I can pass myself off as a potential wholesale customer), but it is sold by the folks at BigTray at $21.95 for the 9 3/8" and $25.95 for the 11" (the two most useful sizes for most home users). Here's the Vollrath product:

[Suzanne F]

I've used them wherever I've worked, but I never thought to use them at home. Because:

1. seasoning them is not all that obvious or easy; since they start with a smooth, not obviously porous, surface, and sice they are black, it is difficult to know when/how they are properly seasoned;

2. I never even knew that they could/should be seasoned. We would use them and then throw them to the dishwashers, who would of course scrub them with steel wool because no one ever told them the proper way to care for these pans.

3. They just seem so thin to me; I have trouble believing that they can withstand the same temperatures over time that multi-layer stainless steel can.

That said, maybe I'll try one at home. Then when I'm again in a position to use them at work, I'll try to train the other staff in their proper use and maintenance. Yeah, right.

[Fat Guy]

If you follow this link (same as above, and you may have already) there's a good overview on these pans (which here are also called blue steel -- and when you get them new they do look a bit blue-ish):

http://gasparykitchenproducts.com/steelpans.html

As to #3, I figure if they're the same gauge as a wok they can handle whatever a wok can handle. If you look at the specialized wok burners at Chinese restaurants they're in the 125,000 BTU range. That's like triple the power of a typical Western-style restaurant range and four times the power of the highest-powered semi-pro home ranges. I'm going on about seven years with the two carbon steel pans I own (about $20 each at Zabar's upstairs) and they're in good shape. One of them even got left on a burner empty for an alarming period of time back when I was getting used to the knob layout on my current range (it's the opposite of what you're used to) and I turned off the stockpot but left the skillet on by mistake when I had intended to do the opposite.

[col klink]

So does anybody have these pans outside of a commercial kitchen besides FG? I recently took a cooking course and that's all they had (besides pots) on their range. I'm really interested in trying one out but like Suzanne, I know nothing about care and seasoning.

FG, do you season and care for these pans like cast iron?

[Fat Guy]

Yes, exactly like cast-iron.

[slkinsey]

So does anybody have these pans outside of a commercial kitchen besides FG? I recently took a cooking course and that's all they had (besides pots) on their range. I'm really interested in trying one out but like Suzanne, I know nothing about care and seasoning.

I have a carbon steel crepe pan and a carbon steel omelette pan. Got them for cheap at Bridge. Wouldn't give them up for anything. Although I don't have a carbon steel saute pan, I'd definitely think of getting one if I had a need for more.

FG, do you season and care for these pans like cast iron?

The nice thing about carbon steel is that it doesn't really need to be seasoned exactly like cast iron. This is to say that it's not such a big deal if you need to scour out the pan and start over again. A film of cooking oil and 10-15 minutes on low heat are all that is required. In fact, I find that my omelette pan tends to work better if I give it a little scrubbing with a Scotch Brite pad, brush it with oil, let it heat up for a while and then wipe it out and proceed with the butter, eggs, etc.

[Fat Guy]

it's not such a big deal if you need to scour out the pan and start over again

The same is true of cast-iron.

[Peter B Wolf]

I grew up with them.

Also still used them into the late seventies. They do not work well on electric stoves ( 'plates' worse than 'rings' ), because they are never completely 'flat' after extensive, or even once, use. Un-even heating too.

Old fashioned coal stove, where you could remove top plates for direct fire: IDEAL!

Gas works well also.

Yes they needed 'seasoning'

[slkinsey]

it's not such a big deal if you need to scour out the pan and start over again

The same is true of cast-iron.

Well, except that most cast iron has a rough texture whereas carbon steel has a smooth texture. This is to say that cooking eggs on a cast iron pan that has recently had the seasoning ruined, removed and restarted might be a fairly dicey proposition. It's no big deal with carbon steel. If you like, you can scour out and restart the seasoning on your carbon steel pan every time you use it (this is easy to do because carbon steel is fairly soft) with little trouble. I would not want to try this with cast iron.

[mise en place]

I used one of these to saute a piece of fish. I won't make that mistake again. It turned the fish a dull shade of gray that was, to put it mildly, very unappetizing. That said, they are great for omelets and crepes, when properly seasoned, and other saute work. Because they are relatively light, they don't hold the heat, so they are only good over a constant flame. And, as someone else pointed out, they don't stay flat for long, so they dont work well on a flat cooking surface.

Edited July 1, 2003 by mise en place (log)

[Fat Guy]

I used one of these to saute a piece of fish. I won't make that mistake again.

These pans are especially utilized at the fish stations of restaurants.

[Fat Guy]

If you like, you can scour out and restart the seasoning on your carbon steel pan every time you use it

I scour my cast-iron after each use.

[slkinsey]

If you like, you can scour out and restart the seasoning on your carbon steel pan every time you use it

I scour my cast-iron after each use.

I'm sure you do. So do I.

That's why I said "scour out and restart the seasoning" instead of just "scour."

Look... if you think they season just like cast iron, then I guess we have a difference of opinion there. My carbon steel pans are soft enough that I can easily scour the seasoning pretty much completely off with a Scotch Brite pad. I do not find this to be the case with my cast iron pans, nor would I want it to be.

Maybe my pans are softer than yours, or maybe you treat yours differently than I do mine, or maybe I treat my cast iron differently. Who knows? I know that carbon (aka "mild") steel is different from black (aka "blue") steel, which is annealed. Maybe we don't have quite the same kind of pan.

[Fat Guy]

I know that carbon (aka "mild") steel is different from black (aka "blue") steel, which is annealed.

I learn something new every day. I've always used the terms interchangeably; I've never heard anybody make the distinction, which seems entirely obvious now that you've said it. What I have is all black/blue steel, but I've always referred to it as carbon steel, blue steel, French steel, black metal, whatever -- never made any distinctions.

[slkinsey]

I know that carbon (aka "mild") steel is different from black (aka "blue") steel, which is annealed.

I learn something new every day. I've always used the terms interchangeably; I've never heard anybody make the distinction, which seems entirely obvious now that you've said it. What I have is all black/blue steel, but I've always referred to it as carbon steel, blue steel, French steel, black metal, whatever -- never made any distinctions.

Yeah... according to "The Well-Tooled Kitchen" they're different. The blue/black kind are annealed. I don't know if that makes them harder or not. Your link to Gaspary's Kitchen & Home Products has different listings for black, blue and carbon steel pans. How different they are, I really don't know.

What I can say about mine is that they were definitely not black or blue when I got them, so I have assumed they are regular old unannealed carbon steel. They are quite soft -- easily scratched with a Scotch Brite pad.

[Fat Guy]

Mine are not scratchable with Scotch-Brite. I use a commercial-grade stainless scrubber on them and treat them exactly like cast-iron.

[JasonCampbell]

I have one, a sauté pan, I also have a cast iron skillet, both are treated pretty much the same way in my kitchen. I don't scour the pans, often I don't even use detergent to wash them. Hot water suffices. My black steel pan is slightly warped but that happened because it got plunged in to a sink of tepid water whilst still very hot. I like black steel pans, they are effective and good value for money.

But when it comes to pots I much prefer the catering stuff in aluminium and stainless steel.

[Fat Guy]

I continue to be amazed by the lack of information about and limited availability of these products. It's even more ridiculous than the cast-iron situation. People are spending gazillions of dollars a year on fancy cookware that doesn't work as well as stuff that costs ten bucks. No coincidence, I suppose, given the marketing motives. But the Internet is supposed to be the great consumer equalizer in situations like that -- yet nobody seems to have done a really good page on this stuff.

[JasonCampbell]

... yet nobody seems to have done a really good page on this stuff.

Probably because the fans of cast iron skillets and black steal pans are all too busy cooking?

But you make a good point, you don't need a $100 dollar anything to make good food, my kitchen is made up of things bought piece by piece. There's no matched collections of cookware here. You can start cooking with a heat source, a hand me down knife (which you have had professionally re-sharpened), and a $20 sauté pan. That's how the professionals do it- most often.

As your interests and horizons expand you slowly pick up bits and pieces of culinaria along the way. Hence my stock pot cost £5, my oven £500, and my deep fat fryer £150. One hundred and fifty pounds is a lot of money to cook French fries, but with careful shopping I spent only £80 (second hand), and I cook a mean portion of chips. My £120 food processor remains hidden away under the counter, used twice.

Here in the UK a cast iron skillet is a rare beast, and a black steel pan even rarer. I guess such things are only found in the kitchens of people who cook.

Sorry, I'm digressing...