Besides that and eggs occasionally i never really use my small pans. It's hard to find a sweet spot heat wise for them because my small burners either have to get cranked kind of high or the big burners get them too warm even on the lowest setting.
Brought out one of the big guns tonight! My Wagner #12 doing skillet chicken! Little bit of garlic powder and basil, after browning well I'll do some chicken gravy lightly over top! Sorry for the bad pic...
Looks good. I'd love a #12 some day, but also a huge burner on my stove to go with it. Saw a newer #15 Lodge last year at a flea market. Way too pricey at $80 but man I just keep thinking about what an awesome camp pan that would be.
My God that's a big pan! I have a #14 Cabelas, "made by Lodge" and it's a monster but awesome for camping or outside cooking. You can cook a whole pound of bacon in one shot in that easy.
Today's pan I picked up and put down a few times at an antique store. Unmarked and the handle felt small compared to other pans I have. It was pretty crusty too. The heat ring is really crisp. I thought it was a BS&R, and that is why I grabbed it. I now believe it is a circa 1910 Wagner. BS&R have the line under the handle all the way to the sidewall of the pan. Wagner flatten out pretty clearly. This one sort of fades out and not to flat. The handle is cast a little off too. It has a raised 5 on the top handle and the pan is also a bit smaller than my other #5's. The handle is a bit thinner below the 5 too. It was just different than standard fare pans. I'm happy with it, but it may need electrolysis. It is taking a while with the wire wheel.
No pan purchases lately. I did pack the collection away for a few weeks. I only have a #8 and #10 skillet out. Instead of packing all the pans in totes, I put a small rope doubled through all the stacked pan handles. I used a piece of plastic tube for a handle. It was easy to move them one bunch in each hand. Tonight's supper was pan fried salisbury steaks with carrots, Dutch egg noodles and gravy.
1 pound of ground beef 1 egg Half cup of Panko bread crumbs Salt, pepper and onion powder to taste. It is pretty basic. Just like a mini meatloaf.
Messaged a lady on facebook marketplace who was advertising piles of cast iron pans she unearthed from someone's home. My guess is she's an antique dealer, with basically no knowledge of cast iron besides what ebay shows has sold. I inquired about an Erie skillet, turns out it was a size 11 and what I think was a second series. It was rusty and probably not been used in many many years. She said she wanted $330 for it Told her I'd need to see pictures of the cooking surface but that I didn't think it was worth that much. Her response - "Ok have a good day" Later, I found she had it listed on ebay for $350.
In her defense, if she actually knew how to clean up a pan and make it presentable looking, she very possibly could get over $300 for a size 11 Erie on Ebay.
I love all the pictures, especially the ones with food in them... We have an induction stove and the cast iron works great on them. What we don't do in the CI, we use the old stainless steel stuff we pick up at garage sales like WearEver and Lifetime. The stainless works fine on the induction stove as long as a magnet will stick to them. My wife does complain that the larger CI skillets and dutch ovens are too heavy for her but I prefer cooking with them. She likes the Lifetime stuff and she did pick up a set of Cuisinart SS with lids and induction / heat distribution core in the bottom of all the pans. She wanted those because she had never had a new set of pans in her whole life. She's well worth it... even though I always have to clean the cast iron when it gets used... LOL
I would welcome that. That way you know they are being handled correctly so you don't have to season them again and again.
Just finished cleaning them up after cooking some fried potatoes and onions to go with some juicy 1/2 # burgers. The wife thinks I make a terrible greasy mess on the stove, but it cleans up so easy. Sorry, I forgot about getting a picture before we ate it all... LOL
Had a guy bring a couple pans to our shop wanting them sandblasted. Told him it's not what I would do, but he insisted and as we say "the customer is always right"...One of them was just a size 8 newer Lodge, but the other is a pretty cool size 14 round griddle with a handle on it to hang over a fire or something. Must be pretty old as it has a gatemark on the bottom. Kind of a shame to blast it but it sounds like he just uses it over a fire anyway while camping.
