Iron Pots

[Garnier Fructis]

So I recently bought an iron pot and after boiling some water in it and letting it sit, the water has a yellowish color to it. Not very dark, but a light shade. Also, there's a yellow film of stuff at the bottom. The store manager said this is normal and nothing to worry about, but somehow I'm not convinced.

Does anyone know what I'm talking about or have any useful bits on what this stuff is or whether its safe?

[lockedout]

Are we talking cast iron?

[Tradewind]

Don't they need to be "seasoned" somehow first? Kosher salt and oils or something.

[Garnier Fructis]

Don't they need to be "seasoned" somehow first? Kosher salt and oils or something.

You know, I may not have done that actually.

Are we talking cast iron?

Yea, it's cast iron.

[lockedout]

Okay, okay, okay .... to please the masses that need some sort of oven based ritual .... If I was gonna try this sort of bake style seasoning again, I would:

Put on a thin coat of oil/grease all over the cast iron skillet. Inside and outside.
Put foil under the skillet to catch any dripping oil.
Turn your fan on, because this is gonna smoke!
Bake at 400 degrees for 15 minutes.
Wipe out as much grease as you can with a paper towel.
Bake for another 45 minutes, then turn the oven off, leaving the door closed.
After an hour or more, remove from oven.
The nice thing about the oven approach is that you get a layer of seasoning all over the cast iron skillet all at once.

I became a bit obsessed with understanding this stuff and was getting more confused by the minute until this fella Alan straightened me out in a forum: "What you want is a layer of heavily polymerized fat which typically includes a fair bit of carbon black bound up with it." So it is polymerized fat which is hard and slick. The carbon is the black stuff. A couple of chemistry savvy friends explained to me that "polymerized" means that the substance re-arranged its molecules to be in a different state (I hope I have that right). In this case, slick liquid oil becomes slick, rock hard solid oil. Apparently, this is very similar to how paint works.
http://www.richsoil.com/cast-iron.jsp

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Don't they need to be "seasoned" somehow first? Kosher salt and oils or something.

Kosher salt is used for cleaning them instead of soap.

[Garnier Fructis]

Okay, okay, okay .... to please the masses that need some sort of oven based ritual .... If I was gonna try this sort of bake style seasoning again, I would:

I guess I'll give it a whirl. Thanks guys.

[Tradewind]

Kosher salt is used for cleaning them instead of soap.

ah ok, learn something new!

My only cast iron pot is enameled So all of this is new to me lol.

[TirielWoW]

So I recently bought an iron pot and after boiling some water in it and letting it sit, the water has a yellowish color to it. Not very dark, but a light shade. Also, there's a yellow film of stuff at the bottom. The store manager said this is normal and nothing to worry about, but somehow I'm not convinced.

Does anyone know what I'm talking about or have any useful bits on what this stuff is or whether its safe?

I honestly wouldn't boil water in a cast iron pot. If you've seasoned it, you're stripping the seasoning out by boiling water in it. Personally, I use steel pans for boiling water.

[Blueobelisk]

Holy shit locked out. I was gonna tell him put some more effort into washing it, including using alcohol, but what you said was interesting.

[PACOX]

Cast irons are awesome but you have to be very careful with them. I actually wasn't allowed to wash my mom's cast iron because if you do it wrong you could ruin it (at least until you take the time to restore it). Ideally you want to use as little detergent as possible and have the skillet spend as little time as possible in the water.

Don't boil water in a cast iron. Its not ideal.

To season your cast iron, coat it with oil then late it bake in the oven for about an hour. Then you want to get a paper towel and "buff" the skillet, add more oil to whatever you're buffing with (the paper towel) if the skillet is dry.

[dwightyo39]

I use a cast iron skillet in my gas grill. I remove one of the grills and set it on the guards above the elements. Its nice being able to fry food outside so my house doesn't smell like grease (range hood doesn't do much inside).

I can also crank up the heat and sear steaks in the skillet then finish them over indirect heat in the grill.

[Garnier Fructis]

I honestly wouldn't boil water in a cast iron pot. If you've seasoned it, you're stripping the seasoning out by boiling water in it. Personally, I use steel pans for boiling water.

I would, but I'm looking for a large volume at a time. I think what I used to use was a stainless steel pot.

I guess my solution would be to go get a steel one (as you mentioned with using steel pan for water). Thanks anyways guys for the interesting lesson on how to take care of cast iron lol. Which will still come in handy.