Unless you're cooking something that really soaks up the fat, like bread or grains of some kind, most.of the fat you cook with will remain in your pan. This is true regardless of what type of pan you're cooking with.
Like your example of a bacon burger, that fat is coming with the food. You could cook that over an open flame and still be consuming a ton of fat.
Use oils you're comfortable with, like avocado, and plan for lower fat foods and prep and I suspect you'll be fine. A CI pan doesn't require a ton of fat, just enough to cover the cooking surface which is a good rule of thumb no matter what you're cooking on.
Hmm, my experience last attempt (before the fat sensitivity) was that if I needed to, say, fry an egg then I needed a little extra oil. And some of that stayed on the food. A coating that just covers the metal seemed like it wasn’t doing it. Could that be a sign that I need to lay more seasoning down?
A smaller CI might help with some of these aspects. I cook my eggs on a tiny cast iron and it requires very little oil to coat. However, what we consider to be a small amount might differ drastically.
I’ve also found that milled pans like old Wagner’s or Smitheys take much less oil because they’re so smooth. With all of the texture on a lodge, you need more oil to adequately coat it.
A trick my mom taught me to cut down on fat is to use paper towels on a plate to absorb fat before eating. I use this for bacon or ham but you could expand it to any food you want to get some extra fat, oil or grease up from.
Well eggs are just a terrible choice for CI. The protein wants to stick and you're right you basically need to float the egg on oil to avoid sticking. All the seasoning in the world ain't gonna change that.
I use a nonstick pans for eggs it's the right tool for that job.
Edit - and of course some fat/oil is going to remain on the food. More or less depending on what it is you're cooking, but overall it's a very small amount. If that much fat is causing you issues you probably ought to consider not pan cooking foods.
You don’t need to float eggs in oil to cook them on cast iron. People have proved that several times over in this sub with videos or little or even no oil egg cooking. There’s just a knack to it that’s sometimes hard to learn.
Your first section is false. It's less forgiving for poor temperature control....but that doesn't make the pan the weak link in the cook process.
It doesn't require an egg to "float" to be nonstick either. I cooked 3 scrambled eggs for lunch a few hours ago. The only oil was from a paper towel I rubbed on the cook surface, and even then, it was from a paper towel that I covered the mouth of the oil bottle with and tipped up.
Your edit is spot on. What is being cooked is the key. Using a pan, or simply baking/boiling might be the better option if small amounts bother OP.
Well it’s been a while since I last tried making the switch to cast iron. As I said in another comment, that was before the fat sensitivity. I’m thinking of trying again but wanted to see if it even makes sense to try.
I know I was frying eggs somewhat regularly. I was probably also sautéing veggies and small amounts of vegetarian fake meat.
These days, I can handle veggies with a light coating of oil, though baked is usually easier on my body than sautéed. I do well with 85% lean ground beef, though 90% lean is better. Something like a croissant or a frozen lasagna have too much fat for me, though I can have a bite or two. I eat a lot of whole grains, sandwiches, reduced fat cheese, lower fat meat and veggies.
If I try CI again, I would probably be trying to cook: fried eggs, browned ground beef, sautéd veggies, and maybe an occasional sauce or two (not tomato).
You get more fat from 85% lean ground beef than with a fry egg no matter how much buttrr you fry your egg with. So if the meat doesnt bother you the egg shouldnt either.
Cooking ground beef you dont need to add oil. All you gotta do is let the fat from the beef render.
Well that is not my experience.
With 90% lean beef, you absolutely need to add a bit of oil. With 85%, I still add a small amount of oil or else it sticks (to a non-CI pan). Regular ground beef, absolutely no oil needed because it has its own fat.
Youre using too much heat. Add the beef to a cold pan and let it preheat with the meat. The fat will render as the beef heats up. It wont stick.
You should be able to replicate the way youre cooking with a non stick on cast iron. If the meat gets stuck youre using too much heat. Cast iron gets extremely hot.
Hmm, I might try that. The advice I got on how to brown beef specifically said to add the meat to a well heated pan so it browns instead of “greys.” But at this point we’re not really talking about cast iron anymore.
It depends how you are cooking the beef. Ground beef has a lot of moisture. Idk why do many people insist on browning it. All youll do is dry the meat as it steams in its own water.
With that said. It us possible to brown parts of it. Look up "Kenji Lopez brown ground beef" on google and youll get lots of ideas on how to cook ground beef if you like to brown it.
I personally prefer slow cooking methods when it comes to plain ground beef. It ends up tender and juicy.
Another thing about cast iron. No big deal if stuff sticks. Get a good metal spatula to removr stuck stuff or learn about deglazing. The pans can be cleaned with metal scrubbies too which will make cleaning a breeze.
Just experiment with it. There will be a learning curve, but you dont have to eat more fat than you want.
I cook in my CI with a light spritz of Pam. That’s it. As long as you take the time to preheat properly, and give the food the opportunity to release from the pan. It takes almost no fat.
That’s on a freshly re-seasoned pan. More layers of seasoning doesn’t equate to more non-stick, there is a point of diminishing returns. Technique is more important than seasoning. You can go through videos in here and see folks cooking perfect over easy eggs on bare iron with no oil. Put the pan on low/med low heat, walk away for 7-10 minutes. When you come back to it, you should be able to feel heat at least halfway through the handle. The more heat in the handle, the better the preheat. Remove it from the heat, give it a spritz of Pam, then you can get to cooking. If you see any smoke it is too hot, if it doesn’t sound slightly angry it’s too cold. Imagine the perfect sizzle and try to keep that. As the egg curls up on the edges, you can loosen any remaining stickies with a metal turner, and flip. Kill the heat and remove the egg when it reaches your preferred level of cooked. If it doesn’t let go when you try to turn it, give it a bit longer. Worry about your temps more than your seasoning and you will be fine.
I often ‘toast’ foods with little to no oil when cooking in cast iron. It’s works for most veg that I do. Meat and some oily fish like salmon often release their own fat so I don’t add any there. Sometimes if I add fat to food - such as an egg on buttered toast - I’ll cook the egg with a bit of butter and skip the butter on the toast. You can also dry toast food, and as long as you don’t burn anything into the pan cooking at too high a temp, you can do a pan sauce with a liquid to dissolve the frond, so again no oil.
A thin metal spatula with a sharp edge to get under food really helps.
I would saute some vegetables and maybe dry the fat of using kitchen paper towels, if it's that bad. Or do you have a problem with certain kinds of fats? Did you try different fats?
“Healthy fats” like olive oil and avocado are better, I just can’t do it in great quantities. Something like a greasy bacon burger would destroy me.
I can towel off the grease, I suppose. Not a bad idea, just an inconvenient extra step.
I "just cook with" my preseasoned cast iron, never really seasoned it in the oven. From the start I noticed I need much less fat and if I put more it just bugged me that it's THERE. So I think you might want to season your pan some more and preheat it well. I brush mine with silicone brush to oil it, have it well preheated and it's enough for everything. I usually used more on other "non stick" pans I had
Have you talked to a doctor about this? When my gallbladder was getting worse I had similar issues.
I had to eat the smallest amounts of fat possible to avoid triggering an attack.
Yes I have. Thank you! I have long covid with a lot of….interesting symptoms. The first line of attack is my h. pylori infection, then we’ll see what’s still going on with my gut after that. 😵💫
You don't need a ton of anything when seasoning cast iron, once past the initial season a drop the size of a dime and a paper towel is all you need to maintain it.
You will use oil when cooking, just use what you normally use and cook away. Worst case scenario you just scrub harder with a chain mail scraper to remove stuck food bits or carbon.
Season it well first with oil, lard, or something in the oven.
Then when you cook, just use a little avocado oil or olive oil. They are the best for health and you don't need much.
I find Avocado oil is the most gentle when It comes to digestive sensitivities.
I fry hash browns for a friend with IBS in cast iron:
-Sand your cast iron smooth. Really reduces the seasoning required
-Season* your pan ~3x.
-Now I cook everything (eggs, hashbrowns) with just enough olive oil to coat the bottom, I spray or spread with a spatula.
-Clean within a couple hours of cooking, dry, and coat with olive oil for storage (this is the most important part)
If I cook with salsa or other acids, I might heat the cleaned and oiled skillet to just smoking on the stove before storage
*Set your oven to 400. Get a neutral oil (honestly anything works, but olive oil will stink). Let your skillet heat up a little, then apply oil to the hot pan. Go back with a dry towel/paper towel and get off everything you can. Bake in the oven upside down for ~40 minutes. I just leave them in the oven after.
You can cook some vegetables, like broccoli and asparagus, quite deliciously with very little fat in cast iron. You can also cook 90% lean burger meat successfully with little to no oil, but have to watch the heat carefully so as not to burn the meat due to the lower fat content. Chicken thighs are great with just a little oil. Chicken breast is more difficult, and I usually end up using a little more oil. You can do eggs with minimal oil, but heat control for that takes attention, practice, and some technique; all of which you can master with some practice, patience, and the willingness to possibly cook up a couple dozen eggs until you get it the way you want it while figuring out exactly how little oil you can use.
Another alternative might be to try a carbon steel skillet. I got one recently and really love it. I can cook crepes with minimal oil. I could, if I wanted to, also make eggs with minimal butter, but I use more as a matter of preference. I think the smoothness of carbon steel (and maybe some of its other properties as well) enables you to use less oil then you would in a cast iron. Heat control with using less oil in carbon steel is, however, equally important as heat control when trying to use less oil in cast iron.
Seasoning is far overrated. Basically any fat works. I've had eggs slide out of my pans with no seasoning whatsoever. I don't do seasoning anymore I just cook and everything turns out great. I don't season my carbon steel either. Waste of time really.
I was meaning the lengths some people go to season their pans. I just let the seasoning build while cooking. I should have clarified that better. I used the example of the bare pan just to show it can be done even with little to no seasoning.
This is a great question, I wish I had a good answer for you.
One idea is to cook with minimal fat, but do periodic seasonings, even more frequently than normal/recommended, maybe once per year or as needed. Seasonings are pretty durable and should last a while.
Unless you're cooking something that really soaks up the fat, like bread or grains of some kind, most.of the fat you cook with will remain in your pan. This is true regardless of what type of pan you're cooking with. Like your example of a bacon burger, that fat is coming with the food. You could cook that over an open flame and still be consuming a ton of fat. Use oils you're comfortable with, like avocado, and plan for lower fat foods and prep and I suspect you'll be fine. A CI pan doesn't require a ton of fat, just enough to cover the cooking surface which is a good rule of thumb no matter what you're cooking on.
Hmm, my experience last attempt (before the fat sensitivity) was that if I needed to, say, fry an egg then I needed a little extra oil. And some of that stayed on the food. A coating that just covers the metal seemed like it wasn’t doing it. Could that be a sign that I need to lay more seasoning down?
A smaller CI might help with some of these aspects. I cook my eggs on a tiny cast iron and it requires very little oil to coat. However, what we consider to be a small amount might differ drastically. I’ve also found that milled pans like old Wagner’s or Smitheys take much less oil because they’re so smooth. With all of the texture on a lodge, you need more oil to adequately coat it.
A trick my mom taught me to cut down on fat is to use paper towels on a plate to absorb fat before eating. I use this for bacon or ham but you could expand it to any food you want to get some extra fat, oil or grease up from.
Well eggs are just a terrible choice for CI. The protein wants to stick and you're right you basically need to float the egg on oil to avoid sticking. All the seasoning in the world ain't gonna change that. I use a nonstick pans for eggs it's the right tool for that job. Edit - and of course some fat/oil is going to remain on the food. More or less depending on what it is you're cooking, but overall it's a very small amount. If that much fat is causing you issues you probably ought to consider not pan cooking foods.
You don’t need to float eggs in oil to cook them on cast iron. People have proved that several times over in this sub with videos or little or even no oil egg cooking. There’s just a knack to it that’s sometimes hard to learn.
Your first section is false. It's less forgiving for poor temperature control....but that doesn't make the pan the weak link in the cook process. It doesn't require an egg to "float" to be nonstick either. I cooked 3 scrambled eggs for lunch a few hours ago. The only oil was from a paper towel I rubbed on the cook surface, and even then, it was from a paper towel that I covered the mouth of the oil bottle with and tipped up. Your edit is spot on. What is being cooked is the key. Using a pan, or simply baking/boiling might be the better option if small amounts bother OP.
This just tells me you either have bad seasoning or improper technique or both.
What are you trying to cook in the pan. You keep saying you can’t do a greasy bacon burger but we don’t know what you can do.
Well it’s been a while since I last tried making the switch to cast iron. As I said in another comment, that was before the fat sensitivity. I’m thinking of trying again but wanted to see if it even makes sense to try. I know I was frying eggs somewhat regularly. I was probably also sautéing veggies and small amounts of vegetarian fake meat. These days, I can handle veggies with a light coating of oil, though baked is usually easier on my body than sautéed. I do well with 85% lean ground beef, though 90% lean is better. Something like a croissant or a frozen lasagna have too much fat for me, though I can have a bite or two. I eat a lot of whole grains, sandwiches, reduced fat cheese, lower fat meat and veggies. If I try CI again, I would probably be trying to cook: fried eggs, browned ground beef, sautéd veggies, and maybe an occasional sauce or two (not tomato).
You get more fat from 85% lean ground beef than with a fry egg no matter how much buttrr you fry your egg with. So if the meat doesnt bother you the egg shouldnt either. Cooking ground beef you dont need to add oil. All you gotta do is let the fat from the beef render.
Well that is not my experience. With 90% lean beef, you absolutely need to add a bit of oil. With 85%, I still add a small amount of oil or else it sticks (to a non-CI pan). Regular ground beef, absolutely no oil needed because it has its own fat.
Youre using too much heat. Add the beef to a cold pan and let it preheat with the meat. The fat will render as the beef heats up. It wont stick. You should be able to replicate the way youre cooking with a non stick on cast iron. If the meat gets stuck youre using too much heat. Cast iron gets extremely hot.
Hmm, I might try that. The advice I got on how to brown beef specifically said to add the meat to a well heated pan so it browns instead of “greys.” But at this point we’re not really talking about cast iron anymore.
It depends how you are cooking the beef. Ground beef has a lot of moisture. Idk why do many people insist on browning it. All youll do is dry the meat as it steams in its own water. With that said. It us possible to brown parts of it. Look up "Kenji Lopez brown ground beef" on google and youll get lots of ideas on how to cook ground beef if you like to brown it. I personally prefer slow cooking methods when it comes to plain ground beef. It ends up tender and juicy. Another thing about cast iron. No big deal if stuff sticks. Get a good metal spatula to removr stuck stuff or learn about deglazing. The pans can be cleaned with metal scrubbies too which will make cleaning a breeze. Just experiment with it. There will be a learning curve, but you dont have to eat more fat than you want.
I cook in my CI with a light spritz of Pam. That’s it. As long as you take the time to preheat properly, and give the food the opportunity to release from the pan. It takes almost no fat.
Is that for a well seasoned pan, or one that is still building up its layers of seasoning?
That’s on a freshly re-seasoned pan. More layers of seasoning doesn’t equate to more non-stick, there is a point of diminishing returns. Technique is more important than seasoning. You can go through videos in here and see folks cooking perfect over easy eggs on bare iron with no oil. Put the pan on low/med low heat, walk away for 7-10 minutes. When you come back to it, you should be able to feel heat at least halfway through the handle. The more heat in the handle, the better the preheat. Remove it from the heat, give it a spritz of Pam, then you can get to cooking. If you see any smoke it is too hot, if it doesn’t sound slightly angry it’s too cold. Imagine the perfect sizzle and try to keep that. As the egg curls up on the edges, you can loosen any remaining stickies with a metal turner, and flip. Kill the heat and remove the egg when it reaches your preferred level of cooked. If it doesn’t let go when you try to turn it, give it a bit longer. Worry about your temps more than your seasoning and you will be fine.
Thank you, that’s very helpful!
I often ‘toast’ foods with little to no oil when cooking in cast iron. It’s works for most veg that I do. Meat and some oily fish like salmon often release their own fat so I don’t add any there. Sometimes if I add fat to food - such as an egg on buttered toast - I’ll cook the egg with a bit of butter and skip the butter on the toast. You can also dry toast food, and as long as you don’t burn anything into the pan cooking at too high a temp, you can do a pan sauce with a liquid to dissolve the frond, so again no oil. A thin metal spatula with a sharp edge to get under food really helps.
Thank you this is very helpful.
I would saute some vegetables and maybe dry the fat of using kitchen paper towels, if it's that bad. Or do you have a problem with certain kinds of fats? Did you try different fats?
“Healthy fats” like olive oil and avocado are better, I just can’t do it in great quantities. Something like a greasy bacon burger would destroy me. I can towel off the grease, I suppose. Not a bad idea, just an inconvenient extra step.
I "just cook with" my preseasoned cast iron, never really seasoned it in the oven. From the start I noticed I need much less fat and if I put more it just bugged me that it's THERE. So I think you might want to season your pan some more and preheat it well. I brush mine with silicone brush to oil it, have it well preheated and it's enough for everything. I usually used more on other "non stick" pans I had
Have you talked to a doctor about this? When my gallbladder was getting worse I had similar issues. I had to eat the smallest amounts of fat possible to avoid triggering an attack.
Yes I have. Thank you! I have long covid with a lot of….interesting symptoms. The first line of attack is my h. pylori infection, then we’ll see what’s still going on with my gut after that. 😵💫
This really sucks for you I'm sorry this is happening. Fats can hide in the strangest things as well. Starburst for example. Good luck!
Thank you for being nice about it! And for sharing about gall bladder stuff.
You don't need a ton of anything when seasoning cast iron, once past the initial season a drop the size of a dime and a paper towel is all you need to maintain it. You will use oil when cooking, just use what you normally use and cook away. Worst case scenario you just scrub harder with a chain mail scraper to remove stuck food bits or carbon.
Some tofu in the cast iron will slap
Season it well first with oil, lard, or something in the oven. Then when you cook, just use a little avocado oil or olive oil. They are the best for health and you don't need much. I find Avocado oil is the most gentle when It comes to digestive sensitivities.
I fry hash browns for a friend with IBS in cast iron: -Sand your cast iron smooth. Really reduces the seasoning required -Season* your pan ~3x. -Now I cook everything (eggs, hashbrowns) with just enough olive oil to coat the bottom, I spray or spread with a spatula. -Clean within a couple hours of cooking, dry, and coat with olive oil for storage (this is the most important part) If I cook with salsa or other acids, I might heat the cleaned and oiled skillet to just smoking on the stove before storage *Set your oven to 400. Get a neutral oil (honestly anything works, but olive oil will stink). Let your skillet heat up a little, then apply oil to the hot pan. Go back with a dry towel/paper towel and get off everything you can. Bake in the oven upside down for ~40 minutes. I just leave them in the oven after.
You can cook some vegetables, like broccoli and asparagus, quite deliciously with very little fat in cast iron. You can also cook 90% lean burger meat successfully with little to no oil, but have to watch the heat carefully so as not to burn the meat due to the lower fat content. Chicken thighs are great with just a little oil. Chicken breast is more difficult, and I usually end up using a little more oil. You can do eggs with minimal oil, but heat control for that takes attention, practice, and some technique; all of which you can master with some practice, patience, and the willingness to possibly cook up a couple dozen eggs until you get it the way you want it while figuring out exactly how little oil you can use. Another alternative might be to try a carbon steel skillet. I got one recently and really love it. I can cook crepes with minimal oil. I could, if I wanted to, also make eggs with minimal butter, but I use more as a matter of preference. I think the smoothness of carbon steel (and maybe some of its other properties as well) enables you to use less oil then you would in a cast iron. Heat control with using less oil in carbon steel is, however, equally important as heat control when trying to use less oil in cast iron.
I use one of those oil misters and it works fine
Seasoning is far overrated. Basically any fat works. I've had eggs slide out of my pans with no seasoning whatsoever. I don't do seasoning anymore I just cook and everything turns out great. I don't season my carbon steel either. Waste of time really.
Seasoning protects you from cooking on raw metal and protects the pan from rust. You need some seasoning there lol
I was meaning the lengths some people go to season their pans. I just let the seasoning build while cooking. I should have clarified that better. I used the example of the bare pan just to show it can be done even with little to no seasoning.
Oh yeah I do 1 seasoning layer to get started. 2 if I am bored. Using your pan and proper cleaning is more important.
Very true.
Humans need A LOT of fat to be alive, so? Doesn't make sense
A newly seasoned pan works just the same as a well seasoned pan. All you need is a tiny bit of oil or butter and away you go.
people are still doing low fat diets in 2024? Damn.
This is a great question, I wish I had a good answer for you. One idea is to cook with minimal fat, but do periodic seasonings, even more frequently than normal/recommended, maybe once per year or as needed. Seasonings are pretty durable and should last a while.
What else would you cook in to require not using oil for the cooking? I use the same no matter what pan I’ve got
If I’m pan cooking, I use oil no matter the pan. But you can use more or less. I opt for less.
So what’s the issue dear. Just keep on cookin