Advisability/Safety of Cooking Acidic Foods in Aluminum Cookware

[Fat Guy]

Well, I thought #2 would be a list of diameter measurements but, in a flashback to my sucky performance in high-school chemistry, I've found that there's a lot more to measuring than meets the eye. Measuring from the inner lip to the inner lip, assuming I've accurately gauged the widest spot on each pan, they all ring in between 10" and 10.25". However, it's hard to get a ruler down into the pan to measure usable cooking space. The cast-iron skillet seems to have substantially more than the others, though, because of its very steep sides. I haven't measured the height of the sides, which should be easy, but I have no idea how to measure the side angles and curves.

[Chris Hennes]

If you want to do side angles you can probably get pretty close by measuring the depth of the pan and then measuring the distance the pan flares out and doing the trig. There will be some measurement slop, but it should get us close enough for whatever our purposes are. Curvature is trickier...

[Edward J]

Paulrapheal,

What I do like to cook with is s/s with a "sandwich bottom", i.e a layer of aluminum sandwiched between the s/s pan and a s/s skin. True, s/s takes longer to heat up, and is not as good a heat conductor as aluminum, but it is far, far, far cleaner to work with, and doesn't warp. At work I cook almost exclusively bon-bon fillings and pastry fillings.. The though of whisking a pastry cream in an aluminum pot makes me shrink, as would making PDF's, nougats, or caramels in an aluminum pot.

For sauteing, I like carbon steel pans. Yes, these do warp--almost as badly as aluminum, but they conduct heat just about as good as aluminum, and the handles are welded on--no loosey-goosey handles and grease/sauce splatters down my wrist and arms.

I could never figure out Anodized cookware. It's quite pricey, almnost as much for a decent quality s/s pot/pan. The bottoms are almost always plain--no cast alum. bottoms or sandwich bottoms to prevent warping. So, what's the point?

[Fat Guy]

If you want to do side angles you can probably get pretty close by measuring the depth of the pan and then measuring the distance the pan flares out and doing the trig. There will be some measurement slop, but it should get us close enough for whatever our purposes are. Curvature is trickier...

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Right, for the straight-sided pans we can use formulas if we can get the right numbers to use as variables. The trouble is that I'm having trouble even getting those numbers, especially on the pans where there's no hard line of demarcation between bottom and walls. I'm hoping these measurements don't matter anyway, but if they do I guess I can always circle back and get them later. It's not like the pans are going to shrink.

[Dave the Cook]

I'm sure you've considered this, but just to keep the record complete: all of the burners on your rangetop are truly identical? Lots of them have varying outputs.

[Fat Guy]

They're all the same in that they're rated the same by the manufacturer and there are no discernible design differences. There's no special simmer burner or extra-power burner on my range (all four burners have a simmer setting; the DCS burner design uses two concentric rings of gas jets, and when you go to simmer only the inner ring, which is covered with a diffuser, stays lit). I've also never noticed one burner working better or worse than the others, though the spark-starter thing on one of them (front right, which I use the most) can be a little glitchy at times.

[Dave the Cook]

Great. Just checking.

[Fat Guy]

I'm now in the process of seasoning per the Globe Equipment instructions cited earlier.

[Fat Guy]

If I may, just an observation on weight, I can't believe how much lighter the bare aluminum pan is than all the others. It's like nothing. I'm not sure this makes a difference for a big guy like me in a home-cooking environment, but I can definitely see how a more fragile person, or someone cooking scores of orders a day in a commercial setting, could benefit from a lighter pan. If it works well.

[David A. Goldfarb]

Right, for the straight-sided pans we can use formulas if we can get the right numbers to use as variables. The trouble is that I'm having trouble even getting those numbers, especially on the pans where there's no hard line of demarcation between bottom and walls. I'm hoping these measurements don't matter anyway, but if they do I guess I can always circle back and get them later. It's not like the pans are going to shrink.

←

If you want to know the volume of each pan, fill them with water and measure with a measuring cup. If it's too tricky to pour the water out, you could put each pan on a scale and fill it to weigh the water.

Edited June 30, 2009 by David A. Goldfarb (log)

[Fat Guy]

#3: Seasoning

I have no idea whether there's any legitimacy to the claim that bare aluminum cookware should be seasoned. And I have no idea what seasoning does in this context. Nonetheless, I seasoned my fry pan.

I washed it with soapy water.

Poured in a little corn oil.

Spread it around with a paper towel.

Heated until colored and smoking.

By the way you can see how soft aluminum is from this shot of the bottom of the pan. This is just from a little moving around on the burner grates.

I washed thoroughly with soapy water and a scrubbing sponge, dried, and repeated two more times.

Then I fried an egg.

Then I ate the egg.

I have no idea what I learned from this, if anything.

[Chris Amirault]

Did it stick?

[David A. Goldfarb]

Good heavens, I've never seen this intentionally done to an aluminum pan. It doesn't seem like a good idea.

[slkinsey]

Right. Note that this looks nothing like the pans in the pictures from Beacon.

[Fat Guy]

I wouldn't say it looks nothing like them. It's just that the discoloration is much more pronounced. Probably if I scrub harder, or with the next level up of scrubbing sponge, it will look more like this, where the discoloration is less overt but the pan still looks quite different from a new one:

Did it stick?

←

No, but I'm not sure what that demonstrates. I mean, I used butter, in the same amount as I'd have used in any other non-non-stick pan. Presumably the butter keeps it from sticking, not anything about the nature of the pan.

[Chris Hennes]

Now, scrub the pan well and cook another egg sans seasoning. My money is on there being no noticeable difference, but I'm happy to be proven wrong...

[Fat Guy]

I scrubbed very well, but can still scrub with extreme elbow grease and probably accomplish more. Most likely, though, I'll need to escalate to a heavier duty scrubbing sponge. Right now I'm using the blue one:

http://www.3m.com/us/home_leisure/scotchbr...ng_sponges.html

I probably need to acquire green or purple. So that experiment will need to wait for my next shopping trip.

[Fat Guy]

Good heavens, I've never seen this intentionally done to an aluminum pan.  It doesn't seem like a good idea.

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It doesn't seem like a good idea to me either, but neither does reducing berry sauce all afternoon in an aluminum pot. I'm trying to take an open-minded, scientific approach here, and leave behind some of my preconceptions.

[LindaK]

I've only owned one aluminum pan--a hand-me-down from my grandmother--and I loved it. A straight-sided skillet with tall sides, it was the perfect size for almost everything, with a perfectly fitted lid. Conducted heat well and was lightweight even when full. Never any oxidation problems. Not so easy to clean, though. By the time it finally died, it was looking a little grungy.

But it was a guilty pleasure. All the hype about stainless steel, etc. made me wonder about my own judgement and standards. It never impressed dinner guests--to the contrary. When the rivets on the handle finally failed a year ago, I said a reluctant and appreciative goodbye. Since then, I've relied on my All-Clad, cast iron, and Le Creuset. Which I also love, but what I'd really love is to find another aluminum pot like the one Nana gave me.

[Emily_R]

Love this post Fat Guy -- will be eagerly awaiting further results!

[nickrey]

3. How best to clean it? This is one area where I've never done well with aluminum. I don't use much unfinished aluminum (I have a lot of anodized, which plays by different rules) but I have a big stockpot and several half-sheet pans. The stockpot, if you scrub it with a metal scrubber, turns the washing water gray. The sheet pans are easily scratched, not that it matters all that much. What's the deal here?

This is not entirely clear to me. The dishwasher is not the answer, because when I have put aluminum sheet pans in the dishwasher, they have discolored and eventually pitted.

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Sitting in the back of my mind was something I heard about aluminium reacting with dishwashing chemicals with potentially explosive consequences.

Checking the Internet, I found this document which states that the machine dishwashing liquid in question "Reacts with aluminium, zinc, tin and alloys of these metals producing flammable hydrogen gas." Perhaps this is what the lost aluminium from the pits in your sheet pans turned into in your dishwasher Sam.

Edited June 30, 2009 by nickrey (log)

[David A. Goldfarb]

It doesn't seem like a good idea to me either, but neither does reducing berry sauce all afternoon in an aluminum pot. I'm trying to take an open-minded, scientific approach here, and leave behind some of my preconceptions.

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I'm following with interest. My surprise isn't directed at your test so much as the fact that the manufacturer recommends a procedure that apparently no one follows. Apologies if that was taken in the wrong light.

Edited June 30, 2009 by David A. Goldfarb (log)

[slkinsey]

Right.  Note that this looks nothing like the pans in the pictures from Beacon.

I wouldn't say it looks nothing like them. It's just that the discoloration is much more pronounced. Probably if I scrub harder, or with the next level up of scrubbing sponge, it will look more like this, where the discoloration is less overt but the pan still looks quite different from a new one:

[image snipped]

I think those pan surfaces look radically and fundamentally different. Have a look:

Your pan clearly shows the beginnings of built-up polymerized fat. This is what we would see on a carbon steel pan or, were it not for the color of the iron, a cast iron pan in the early stages of the "seasoning" process. The pan from Beacon just doesn't show any evidence of any polymerized fat whatsoever, except perhaps for the carbonized scunge built up around the rivets. The difference between your pan out of the box and the Beacon pan is that your pan is shiny, unscratched and flat, whereas the Beacon pan is scratched, dull and warped (which is clear when you see the two pans side-by-side).

Yes, it's true that if you get a hard abrasive and scrub away all of the polymerized fat from your aluminum frypan you might have something that looked like the Beacon pan, but you'd get that without building up the polymerized fat in the first place.

What the Beacon pan looks like to me is similar to the grooved "steak broiling pan" my parents have had for around 50 years. It's made of thick aluminum and shaped to fit inside a larger wooden serving platter. I'm sure everyone has seen one. It's scrubbed clean with a hard abrasive every time it's used. I'd be willing to bet that the guys in the Beacon kitchen scrub out their aluminum frypans too.

For your experiment, I think it was worthwhile to follow the instructions and season the pan. But I think it's pretty clear that this is not the condition in which these pans are ever really used. So now it's scouring away the seasoning and starting over.

[Fat Guy]

I see similar discoloration in places on the Beacon pan. To my eye it's a question of one pan evidencing a lot more of it than the other.

One possibility is that the whole seasoning thing is a crock. That certainly seems to be what you're concluding based on theory. It is admittedly the more likely answer. Everything I know about cookware basics says seasoning aluminum is a crock. Then again, watching the dinner service at Beacon was an "everything I thought about aluminum was wrong" moment. So I'm more open-minded at the moment.

Another possibility is perhaps something like: Aluminum becomes seasoned over time, as it's used repeatedly for cooking. This seasoning, which does not necessarily appear as black or brown but is more along the lines of a sealant, makes the pan less reactive, gives better release properties, etc. A well-seasoned aluminum pan can be used for tomato sauce, berry sauce, et al., no problem. One way to season aluminum is to cook in it over a period of years. The other way is to do what Lincoln Smallwares and Globe Equipment say to do and then rub the brown stuff off with elbow grease but without abrasive scouring.

Sounds unlikely, but I'm going to pursue the possibility.

[David A. Goldfarb]

Maybe the surface of a freshly spun aluminum pan just has more tooth than one that's been scrubbed and worn down with use, polymerized fats aside. An older pan will have pits and knicks, but maybe the greater part of the surface is just smoother.