So glad to see someone who knows what they are doing addressing this. A few years ago I watched a video that swore that you should season your stainless steel cookware. I never heard of this before but wanted to try. I followed the directions and I believe it worked (maybe) once. After that it was the usual shenanigans. I always felt bad about this. Now I know better and that I shouldn't bother!
I feel like something needs pointed out here: There isn't any scholarly research on seasoning cookware. Nobody outside of manufacturers have actually tested different methods or oils or looked at the polymer structures under a microscope as far as I'm aware. In short: nobody technically "knows what they're doing" when it comes to seasoning cookware except for maybe the people working in manufacturing
In your video about seasoning other pans, you said that this (1:25) is a symptom of using too much oil to season. (And yes, that's clearly just stuck-on grease.) Why isn't this just the same situation? Why not try it with way less oil? Did you actively "unseason" the pan, too? If it's been regularly used, it should have some seasoning already from that, if I understood right? (And "proper" seasoning/adsorption shouldn't wash off.) I know some brands even claim to do an initial seasoning at the factory. It sounds like from other replies that you're saying the "unseasoned" pan is plenty seasoned already, in which case the takeaway is *close* to the same (you don't need to season it)... Until someone takes steel wool to it, and then you actually do need to do another "initial" seasoning.
Great questions - After I rubbed the oil in, I wiped the pan until it was dry with multiple paper towels before heating it. But for some reason, once it started heating up, the oil would not stop beading/sweating. It didn't absorb into the steel like it normally does with carbon steel or cast iron. I kept wiping it throughout the heating process and it still kept beading. In the end, the key point is that any minor benefit is not worth the trouble.
@@AySz88 Seasoning is much more likely to fall off of stainless steel due to the material composition and the surface finish. I've never heard of a company preseasoning stainless steel either, as they often recommend against seasoning their stainless steel products.
The "seasoned" stainless steel pan looks exactly like a dirty stainless steel pan. Those sticky yellow bits tend to build up along the sides and require a good scrub when cleaning and are quite sticky as you mentioned. I can't imagine a scenario where this is desirable.
You provide some amazingly good, solid testing and advice for cookware. I am not sure why your channel doesn't have a lot more subs than it currently does, but anyone reading this... subscribe. These are the kinds of reviews you need when making BIFL cookware purchases.
Neat experiment, but I really don't get why people want to season stainless steel. If I'm pulling out my stainless steel pan, I WANT things to stick and form a fond. I can pull out my nonstick/carbon steel stuff for the rest.
I think it probably comes from wanting a nonstick surface without the weight and fuss of cast iron or the environmental impacts of stuff like Teflon. Teflon being bad for us might still be up for debate, but it's indisputably bad for the environment.
@@ajchapeliere The weight isn't that big of a difference (IME, and at least between carbon steel and stainless steel, I don't have cast iron to compare with). You're going to have similar fuss with a stainless steel pan. While you don't have to worry about rust, between the material itself and the surface geometry, the seasoning will flake off pretty easily. You need to be more careful when cleaning to keep it, and you're not going to build up the seasoning layer that well just by cooking either, so you'll need to re-season often. And most things besides eggs (which do pretty well in the video though) either don't stick or will initially stick but eventually release with proper heat and time, and as I mentioned, leave a fond. Also, if you really need something decently non-stick, but don't want to go the teflon or the cast iron/carbon steel route, there's always ceramic, which is generally lighter, less fussy, and for acidic-food friendly than cast iron.
I heard on another video that you shouldn't use butter to season a pan as the milk solids form a "crust" which causes sticking. Also avoid seed oils. Use tallow.
What I notaced is that my stainless steel pan becomes non stick only after frying something first, like an egg. (First one is a mess but others are perfect). Maybe my pan isn't hot enough after adding oil?
It can be that the oil either isn't allowed to heat up for long enough (should at least sizzle when you add food), or isn't distributed well enough (in which case you'll get sticking in some places but not in others)
What kind of thermometer are you using to check pan temps? Maybe I am just bad at using stainless steel and carbon steel pans, but I still can't get anywhere close to that level of nonstick.... I wonder if I have the stove too hot or too cold? I tried checking with a few drops of water for the Leidenfrost effect before cooking and still get eggs sticking... Tried using butter, grapeseed oil, ghee, doesn't matter. It's why I still have a couple Teflon pans around, I just cannot get certain foods like eggs to not stick
Does your oil smoke a bit when you put it in? Are you making plain scrambled or do you add things to the eggs? What do your eggs look like as you pour them in? I have finally got it down (for eggs only lol), but it is a learning curve. I make them with coconut oil or ghee. Get the pan hot until every bit of water dances, even if it's a larger puddle, then add oil until it smokes just a bit and pour your scrambled eggs in immediately you should see bubbles forming under their surface. They're good to stir right away (which is how I cook mine, I like them fluffy but I know everyone like to make them a bit different). Make sure you get the oil everywhere. My eggs still stick on the pan walls if I don't oil them. I know this is all basic tips, but if you miss even one bit they'll probably stick, you have to be a bit ritualistic with the stainless. And make sure you're using a heavy bottomed pan, cheap one's always stick. I threw ALL of my cheap stainless in the trash, because that's what it is. Trash. I still haven't got the hang of doughs 100% yet. Not sure why some stick but others don't. I've made low carb pancakes and crepes (mostly egg, with some flour and gelatin, that is), but haven't quite got down the regular batters.
The temperature of the pan decides whether or not it will stick. I watched a video showing how to test it. Splash water onto it and if it forms tiny beads which roll around the pan then it is hot enough that your food won't stick. Sorry I can't remember more than that.
Do you think a patina after some use protects against pitting from salt? I jacked up my brand new pan by adding salt to pasta water while it was still cold and not stirring
Can you do a video that teaches how to sear meats on SS pans? Your egg videos were super helpful, but I'm not sure about meats, and whether to lower temps or maintain them or what temp to start off at
Perhaps you made a mistake in trying to season it using similar methods as how cast iron and carbon steel pans would be seasoned. It would've been very interesting if you tried another known method of seasoning the stainless steel pan. Look up a video called "Making a stainless steel pan non-stick" by the user mondeuseo. Consider testing it again using that method. After seasoning the stainless steel pan the way he does it, the gentlemen in the video literally makes scramble eggs with virtually no sticking whatsoever.
You need to redo the experiment one more time. The oil in your seasoned pan got sticky because when you brought that particular oil to its smoking point it polymerized. The same process is used to turn linseed oil into linoleum for flooring use. You need to try seasoning the test pan with lard or beef fat as that will not polymerize. But it is still likely the coating will not last long or adhere well to stainless as it would to cast iron.
You said that you seasoned it with "oil." What type of oil did you use? You can't use a regular cooking oil, it has to be high-fat. IMO, you didn't really season the pan correctly. I feel the verdict is still out.
Well... That's terrible. Since it's the exact opposite on all 3 steel pans in my kitchen. And a bunch of other pans I used when traveling. In my case - just letting any amount of oil smoke for a few seconds (before cooling back down) makes the pan non-stick until washed. I've used as little as a drop of lard, to a few tablespoons of seed oil - it just needs to get hot once! Then it's non-stick, I don't even need to use butter.
I love most of Prudent Reviews videos, but I think this one misses the mark. Seasoning stainless steel is not supposed to be done like you season a cast iron skillet. You're supposed to "spot season"' the pan, then immediately fry your food in it, without ever letting it cool down and form that gummy surface he complained about. I would be interested to see him test his pans that way, although the fact that he sees no sticking at all when he doesn't season his pan sort of makes that a moot point.
I’ll need to try that. I went with the most common method (according to my research). But like you mentioned, the key point is that you shouldn’t have to do anything beyond preheating and greasing the pan with fat to get nonstick results.
Interesting. Any idea why the seasening layer is sticky and not hard and smooth? Maybe it would make a difference to heat it longer? I don't really use cast iron, but doesn't the seasoning process take like 2 hours in the oven or something? Did the oil even have a chance to polymerise properly in such a short time? Not that feel that stainless steel needs seasoning, necessarily. Not as long as one doesn't mind cooking with a decent amount of fat. I'm just curious for curiosities sake.
I believe this is correct. I used the same stovetop method that I use with carbon steel pans and as long as the oil is wiped dry there's no sticking. With stainless steel, the oil kept "sweating" as the pan heated.
@@PrudentReviews Cool, thanks. I'll take your word for it then! I wish I had discovered stainless steel pans sooner. Could have saved myself from buying a new Teflon coated pan every two years for two decades 🫣
hey and thank you for another video ! would you be up to making a review about "Our Place Titanium Always Pan Pro - No-Coating Nonstick Technology | Tri-Ply" ? they claim to be titanium but fully nonestick without coating and im really wondering if its gimik or real or how they compare to hestan nanobond titaum ! will really appreciate it ! thank you!
My pleasure! Thanks for watching. I reviewed that pan a few months ago. Here it is: The Non-Stick Pan That Lasts Forever: Too Good to Be True? ua-cam.com/video/DdpXbrPj0GQ/v-deo.html
@@PrudentReviews thank you very much just watched ! i guess i could wait for newer version with better design ! tbh once i learned to use my nanobond i have 0 issue with sticking and cleaning them is easiest thing.. only for very specific small stuff i need nonestick but 99.999% i do on my nanobond now days . ill be happy if they make a woke like this or better design pan ty!
Thanks for the post. I don't like to waste time, and this video cut to the chase. I've read so many posts about how to season stainless steel, glad I didn't have to waste any time discovering this on my own.
I think this is because you used a Made In. I have both MI and All-Clad. The Made In's brushed surface has a tendency to trap liquids in the grooves of the brushing. So when you tried to season it, you weren't able to wipe off all the excess oil as you could have done with a smooth surface pan like an All-Clad. Others have done this same seasoning experiment before, and they didn't get the stickiness, but it also didn't improve the non-stick. So bottom line, you can't season SS.
You can’t use just any old oil to season stainless! You need King Cobra Oil! But seriously, thanks for reducing the appetite of my OCD 😉👍 Now I just have to find some other unnecessary thing to do 😂
This is nonsense brother. You can season stainless steel and turn it just as black as cast iron. It just takes a while. I've done it with a Mauviel skillet. It doesn't hold onto the seasoning as well of course but it's very black and quite nonstick.
Thanks for doing this test. As ever, you are the king of helpers for ordinary folk understanding why stainless steel is the way to go. 5-Stars, no. 15-Stars, absolutely, YES 🎉
The results will be the same. Seasoning stainless steel pan is not necessary. One reason to add butter when frying eggs is butter is more non-stick than oil alone. But if you do not like butter, just skip it. The pan temperature is the most important fact of non-stick when cooking on stainless steel pans.
@@sysopr I know that you can't season a stainless steel pan. I'm asking about the best way to cook eggs if you don't want to use butter. I guess that margerine would pretty much perform just like butter or even better. But what's the best way if you just want to use an oil (e.g. olive oil)? I'd like to see tests. Personally, when i just use oil i bring the oil the the smoke point just for a second. Then i let the pan imediately cool down to the desired temperature and then i put in my eggs. With just oil this worked the best for me so far.
That's a good idea. I find that butter really helps to make stainless steel non-stick. But it's certainly possible to skip the butter and just use oil.
You found the same thing as me, that seasoned stainless is even worse than unseasoned LOL :) The experience was 100% the same, washed my seasoned stainless 3-4 times and went away.
50% true, depending on the composition of the stainless steel. Temperature is very important.... i use the water test..... when the water drops dances around the pan, it is ready for cooking.
If the seasoning was done properly, it would have the same exact food release properties of seasoned cast iron and carbon steel. You had way too much oil baked on to the pan (didn't you show us this error on another video?), and a single application is sufficient. -I can only tell if my pan's seasoning is good by how well it releases cold-start eggs. It should be barely visible if visible at all and doesn't wash off that easy. It shouldn't have beaded like that. Halle Cottis has the video on it that I learned from. Seasoning smooths the pan out filling in micro-scratches (the pan could be polished for food release also -Boedy Pennington did a video on that). For my old scratched up pans; seasoning works (when done right).
I wiped that pan with several dry paper towels. There was no visible oil on it at the start of heating. I don’t know if “absorb” is the right word, but the oil didn’t take to the steel in the same way it does with cast iron and carbon steel. I’m sure there are many ways to season a stainless steel pan and some are better than others but the key point here is that a totally unseasoned steel pan can be just as nonstick if you heat and grease it right.
This is extremely dishonest and lazy. You should be ashamed of yourself. You admitted that you messed up the seasoning process and then you continue to do your tests and come up with a result. We all know that if you had done the same to a cast iron pan and messed up the seasoning process, the non-stickiness would be messed up.
Friendly reminder that, as far as i know, nobody has done scholarly research to see what the most effective ways of seasoning cookware are or what oils are best. There's a boatload of anecdotal stuff. Some people swear by flax seed oil, others don't like it because they think the patina is too hard and prone to chipping. Some people think you need to have the pan "ripping hot", others day you just need to get to the smoke point of the oil. It's largely a bunch of people fumbling around until they find something that works for them.
@@ajchapeliere Wrong on essentially all accounts, except for your contention that opinions are like assholes and that everybody has one. There is science behind proper seasoning. Plastics are made from oils, and this process is utilized in seasoning. Whenever an oil is correctly heated for seasoning, it goes through a chemical process known as polymerization. A new heat resistant plastic compound is created on the surface like an epoxy. You can look this up. It's basic chemistry. Just like everybody has an opinion, some people know what they're talking about and others clearly don't. I'm certain that it's obvious which categories we fit into.
It always feels good to find out that less effort creates better results.
So glad to see someone who knows what they are doing addressing this. A few years ago I watched a video that swore that you should season your stainless steel cookware. I never heard of this before but wanted to try. I followed the directions and I believe it worked (maybe) once. After that it was the usual shenanigans. I always felt bad about this. Now I know better and that I shouldn't bother!
There’s a lot of “how to season stainless steel” content out there, but no one really addresses if it works and for how long
I feel like something needs pointed out here:
There isn't any scholarly research on seasoning cookware. Nobody outside of manufacturers have actually tested different methods or oils or looked at the polymer structures under a microscope as far as I'm aware.
In short: nobody technically "knows what they're doing" when it comes to seasoning cookware except for maybe the people working in manufacturing
@@ajchapeliere it’s all trial and error
In your video about seasoning other pans, you said that this (1:25) is a symptom of using too much oil to season. (And yes, that's clearly just stuck-on grease.) Why isn't this just the same situation? Why not try it with way less oil?
Did you actively "unseason" the pan, too? If it's been regularly used, it should have some seasoning already from that, if I understood right? (And "proper" seasoning/adsorption shouldn't wash off.) I know some brands even claim to do an initial seasoning at the factory.
It sounds like from other replies that you're saying the "unseasoned" pan is plenty seasoned already, in which case the takeaway is *close* to the same (you don't need to season it)... Until someone takes steel wool to it, and then you actually do need to do another "initial" seasoning.
Great questions - After I rubbed the oil in, I wiped the pan until it was dry with multiple paper towels before heating it. But for some reason, once it started heating up, the oil would not stop beading/sweating. It didn't absorb into the steel like it normally does with carbon steel or cast iron. I kept wiping it throughout the heating process and it still kept beading. In the end, the key point is that any minor benefit is not worth the trouble.
@@AySz88 Seasoning is much more likely to fall off of stainless steel due to the material composition and the surface finish. I've never heard of a company preseasoning stainless steel either, as they often recommend against seasoning their stainless steel products.
The "seasoned" stainless steel pan looks exactly like a dirty stainless steel pan. Those sticky yellow bits tend to build up along the sides and require a good scrub when cleaning and are quite sticky as you mentioned. I can't imagine a scenario where this is desirable.
You provide some amazingly good, solid testing and advice for cookware. I am not sure why your channel doesn't have a lot more subs than it currently does, but anyone reading this... subscribe. These are the kinds of reviews you need when making BIFL cookware purchases.
Thank you so much! Really appreciate the support
Neat experiment, but I really don't get why people want to season stainless steel. If I'm pulling out my stainless steel pan, I WANT things to stick and form a fond. I can pull out my nonstick/carbon steel stuff for the rest.
I think it probably comes from wanting a nonstick surface without the weight and fuss of cast iron or the environmental impacts of stuff like Teflon. Teflon being bad for us might still be up for debate, but it's indisputably bad for the environment.
@@ajchapeliere The weight isn't that big of a difference (IME, and at least between carbon steel and stainless steel, I don't have cast iron to compare with). You're going to have similar fuss with a stainless steel pan. While you don't have to worry about rust, between the material itself and the surface geometry, the seasoning will flake off pretty easily. You need to be more careful when cleaning to keep it, and you're not going to build up the seasoning layer that well just by cooking either, so you'll need to re-season often.
And most things besides eggs (which do pretty well in the video though) either don't stick or will initially stick but eventually release with proper heat and time, and as I mentioned, leave a fond.
Also, if you really need something decently non-stick, but don't want to go the teflon or the cast iron/carbon steel route, there's always ceramic, which is generally lighter, less fussy, and for acidic-food friendly than cast iron.
No. He messed up the test and then just continued to plod along
I heard on another video that you shouldn't use butter to season a pan as the milk solids form a "crust" which causes sticking. Also avoid seed oils. Use tallow.
What I notaced is that my stainless steel pan becomes non stick only after frying something first, like an egg. (First one is a mess but others are perfect). Maybe my pan isn't hot enough after adding oil?
It can be that the oil either isn't allowed to heat up for long enough (should at least sizzle when you add food), or isn't distributed well enough (in which case you'll get sticking in some places but not in others)
What kind of thermometer are you using to check pan temps?
Maybe I am just bad at using stainless steel and carbon steel pans, but I still can't get anywhere close to that level of nonstick.... I wonder if I have the stove too hot or too cold?
I tried checking with a few drops of water for the Leidenfrost effect before cooking and still get eggs sticking...
Tried using butter, grapeseed oil, ghee, doesn't matter. It's why I still have a couple Teflon pans around, I just cannot get certain foods like eggs to not stick
It is Thermapen Pro Surface.
Does your oil smoke a bit when you put it in? Are you making plain scrambled or do you add things to the eggs?
What do your eggs look like as you pour them in?
I have finally got it down (for eggs only lol), but it is a learning curve.
I make them with coconut oil or ghee.
Get the pan hot until every bit of water dances, even if it's a larger puddle, then add oil until it smokes just a bit and pour your scrambled eggs in immediately you should see bubbles forming under their surface. They're good to stir right away (which is how I cook mine, I like them fluffy but I know everyone like to make them a bit different).
Make sure you get the oil everywhere. My eggs still stick on the pan walls if I don't oil them.
I know this is all basic tips, but if you miss even one bit they'll probably stick, you have to be a bit ritualistic with the stainless. And make sure you're using a heavy bottomed pan, cheap one's always stick. I threw ALL of my cheap stainless in the trash, because that's what it is. Trash.
I still haven't got the hang of doughs 100% yet. Not sure why some stick but others don't. I've made low carb pancakes and crepes (mostly egg, with some flour and gelatin, that is), but haven't quite got down the regular batters.
lard is the best but still not infallible.
The temperature of the pan decides whether or not it will stick. I watched a video showing how to test it. Splash water onto it and if it forms tiny beads which roll around the pan then it is hot enough that your food won't stick. Sorry I can't remember more than that.
its called the leidenfrost effect
Do you think a patina after some use protects against pitting from salt? I jacked up my brand new pan by adding salt to pasta water while it was still cold and not stirring
Can you do a review for Henkels or Cuisinart stainless steel?
Can you do a video that teaches how to sear meats on SS pans? Your egg videos were super helpful, but I'm not sure about meats, and whether to lower temps or maintain them or what temp to start off at
Great idea!
I wonder what it is about the steel that makes the oil bead up and not act like the oil does on cast iron for example.
Interesting, thanks.
Please review saladmaster cookware if you can
Perhaps you made a mistake in trying to season it using similar methods as how cast iron and carbon steel pans would be seasoned. It would've been very interesting if you tried another known method of seasoning the stainless steel pan. Look up a video called "Making a stainless steel pan non-stick" by the user mondeuseo.
Consider testing it again using that method. After seasoning the stainless steel pan the way he does it, the gentlemen in the video literally makes scramble eggs with virtually no sticking whatsoever.
Would you make a video on Pan Warping and how to prevent it / fix it?
Here it is! :) ua-cam.com/video/NwMNZPTKNAQ/v-deo.html
@PrudentReviews oh damn, thank you
I can assume that pan was non sticked before the test? 🧐🧐 seasoning the pan is for the normal pan without coating
You need to redo the experiment one more time. The oil in your seasoned pan got sticky because when you brought that particular oil to its smoking point it polymerized. The same process is used to turn linseed oil into linoleum for flooring use.
You need to try seasoning the test pan with lard or beef fat as that will not polymerize. But it is still likely the coating will not last long or adhere well to stainless as it would to cast iron.
Great info thanks.
The eggs didn’t stick in the unseasoned pan, regardless of temperature?
You said that you seasoned it with "oil." What type of oil did you use? You can't use a regular cooking oil, it has to be high-fat. IMO, you didn't really season the pan correctly. I feel the verdict is still out.
Well... That's terrible.
Since it's the exact opposite on all 3 steel pans in my kitchen. And a bunch of other pans I used when traveling.
In my case - just letting any amount of oil smoke for a few seconds (before cooling back down) makes the pan non-stick until washed.
I've used as little as a drop of lard, to a few tablespoons of seed oil - it just needs to get hot once!
Then it's non-stick, I don't even need to use butter.
Anybody else running to the kitchen to check if they have eggs to fry ?? 🏃♂🏃♂🥚🥚
😂
I love most of Prudent Reviews videos, but I think this one misses the mark. Seasoning stainless steel is not supposed to be done like you season a cast iron skillet. You're supposed to "spot season"' the pan, then immediately fry your food in it, without ever letting it cool down and form that gummy surface he complained about. I would be interested to see him test his pans that way, although the fact that he sees no sticking at all when he doesn't season his pan sort of makes that a moot point.
I’ll need to try that. I went with the most common method (according to my research). But like you mentioned, the key point is that you shouldn’t have to do anything beyond preheating and greasing the pan with fat to get nonstick results.
Interesting. Any idea why the seasening layer is sticky and not hard and smooth? Maybe it would make a difference to heat it longer? I don't really use cast iron, but doesn't the seasoning process take like 2 hours in the oven or something? Did the oil even have a chance to polymerise properly in such a short time?
Not that feel that stainless steel needs seasoning, necessarily. Not as long as one doesn't mind cooking with a decent amount of fat.
I'm just curious for curiosities sake.
I guess the alloy in stainless steel does not bond very well to the oil, so it creates what you saw in the video.
@longhoacaophuc8293
I'm so tempted to try, but I don't want to accidentally ruin my pans 😅
I believe this is correct. I used the same stovetop method that I use with carbon steel pans and as long as the oil is wiped dry there's no sticking. With stainless steel, the oil kept "sweating" as the pan heated.
You can't really ruin them. If it ends up sticky, you can scrub it away and get back to square one.
@@PrudentReviews
Cool, thanks. I'll take your word for it then!
I wish I had discovered stainless steel pans sooner. Could have saved myself from buying a new Teflon coated pan every two years for two decades 🫣
Interesting findings! Thank you
I was surprised!
hey and thank you for another video ! would you be up to making a review about "Our Place Titanium Always Pan Pro - No-Coating Nonstick Technology | Tri-Ply" ? they claim to be titanium but fully nonestick without coating and im really wondering if its gimik or real or how they compare to hestan nanobond titaum ! will really appreciate it ! thank you!
My pleasure! Thanks for watching. I reviewed that pan a few months ago. Here it is:
The Non-Stick Pan That Lasts Forever: Too Good to Be True?
ua-cam.com/video/DdpXbrPj0GQ/v-deo.html
@@PrudentReviews thank you very much just watched ! i guess i could wait for newer version with better design ! tbh once i learned to use my nanobond i have 0 issue with sticking and cleaning them is easiest thing.. only for very specific small stuff i need nonestick but 99.999% i do on my nanobond now days . ill be happy if they make a woke like this or better design pan ty!
Oils ain’t oils. I have no issues using ghee in the process. However, it is an art form, heat range and oil type is fundamental.
I've learned more about cooking from this channel than any of the youtube chefs. Next pan I'm buying is coming from an affiliate link.
That means a lot - thank you!
Thanks for the post. I don't like to waste time, and this video cut to the chase. I've read so many posts about how to season stainless steel, glad I didn't have to waste any time discovering this on my own.
You're welcome - glad you liked it!
I think this is because you used a Made In.
I have both MI and All-Clad. The Made In's brushed surface has a tendency to trap liquids in the grooves of the brushing. So when you tried to season it, you weren't able to wipe off all the excess oil as you could have done with a smooth surface pan like an All-Clad.
Others have done this same seasoning experiment before, and they didn't get the stickiness, but it also didn't improve the non-stick.
So bottom line, you can't season SS.
So good! I intuitively knew this, but you provided the proof. Thank you!
im tired of eating Teflon, I will master steel pans for 2025!
You can’t use just any old oil to season stainless! You need King Cobra Oil! But seriously, thanks for reducing the appetite of my OCD 😉👍 Now I just have to find some other unnecessary thing to do 😂
Glad to help! 😂
This is nonsense brother. You can season stainless steel and turn it just as black as cast iron. It just takes a while. I've done it with a Mauviel skillet. It doesn't hold onto the seasoning as well of course but it's very black and quite nonstick.
Lol why, just keep stainless clean and you're good to go...
The egg is sticking because you’re not giving it enough time to cook. Give it a minute more. Then Shake.
Thanks for doing this test. As ever, you are the king of helpers for ordinary folk understanding why stainless steel is the way to go. 5-Stars, no. 15-Stars, absolutely, YES 🎉
Thank you so much for watching and all your support - really appreciate it!
@PrudentReviews Thank YOU for all your excellent posts.
Can you make tests without butter for people, who do not want to use butter (just oil or margerine)?
The results will be the same. Seasoning stainless steel pan is not necessary. One reason to add butter when frying eggs is butter is more non-stick than oil alone. But if you do not like butter, just skip it. The pan temperature is the most important fact of non-stick when cooking on stainless steel pans.
@@sysopr
I know that you can't season a stainless steel pan. I'm asking about the best way to cook eggs if you don't want to use butter.
I guess that margerine would pretty much perform just like butter or even better. But what's the best way if you just want to use an oil (e.g. olive oil)?
I'd like to see tests. Personally, when i just use oil i bring the oil the the smoke point just for a second. Then i let the pan imediately cool down to the desired temperature and then i put in my eggs. With just oil this worked the best for me so far.
That's a good idea. I find that butter really helps to make stainless steel non-stick. But it's certainly possible to skip the butter and just use oil.
You found the same thing as me, that seasoned stainless is even worse than unseasoned LOL :)
The experience was 100% the same, washed my seasoned stainless 3-4 times and went away.
It’s too bad :) they make it seem like a “hack” that always works
Even worse? An SS is very nonstick if proper temp control is exercised.
No is the answer
50% true, depending on the composition of the stainless steel. Temperature is very important.... i use the water test..... when the water drops dances around the pan, it is ready for cooking.
you are soooo epic and helpful dude. thank you a bunch for your work.
Truly great videos!
You made plastic on your pan. Awesome bub...
I heat the pan, spray avacado oil, then add butter. Never had eggs stick.
thank you, i just bought a whole set and people told me to season, i guess dont have to now 😊
Disaster.
If the seasoning was done properly, it would have the same exact food release properties of seasoned cast iron and carbon steel. You had way too much oil baked on to the pan (didn't you show us this error on another video?), and a single application is sufficient. -I can only tell if my pan's seasoning is good by how well it releases cold-start eggs. It should be barely visible if visible at all and doesn't wash off that easy. It shouldn't have beaded like that. Halle Cottis has the video on it that I learned from. Seasoning smooths the pan out filling in micro-scratches (the pan could be polished for food release also -Boedy Pennington did a video on that). For my old scratched up pans; seasoning works (when done right).
I wiped that pan with several dry paper towels. There was no visible oil on it at the start of heating. I don’t know if “absorb” is the right word, but the oil didn’t take to the steel in the same way it does with cast iron and carbon steel. I’m sure there are many ways to season a stainless steel pan and some are better than others but the key point here is that a totally unseasoned steel pan can be just as nonstick if you heat and grease it right.
This is extremely dishonest and lazy. You should be ashamed of yourself. You admitted that you messed up the seasoning process and then you continue to do your tests and come up with a result. We all know that if you had done the same to a cast iron pan and messed up the seasoning process, the non-stickiness would be messed up.
He doesn't know how to season. It was completely wrong. You don't put oil on it until you see smoke and stop. That's how you screw up a pan.
How then?
Friendly reminder that, as far as i know, nobody has done scholarly research to see what the most effective ways of seasoning cookware are or what oils are best. There's a boatload of anecdotal stuff. Some people swear by flax seed oil, others don't like it because they think the patina is too hard and prone to chipping. Some people think you need to have the pan "ripping hot", others day you just need to get to the smoke point of the oil. It's largely a bunch of people fumbling around until they find something that works for them.
@@ajchapeliere Wrong on essentially all accounts, except for your contention that opinions are like assholes and that everybody has one. There is science behind proper seasoning. Plastics are made from oils, and this process is utilized in seasoning. Whenever an oil is correctly heated for seasoning, it goes through a chemical process known as polymerization. A new heat resistant plastic compound is created on the surface like an epoxy. You can look this up. It's basic chemistry. Just like everybody has an opinion, some people know what they're talking about and others clearly don't. I'm certain that it's obvious which categories we fit into.
Stop using “vegetable” oil… so dumb!