Read Online Consider the Fork: A History of How We Cook and Eat by Bee Wilson - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Bee Wilson
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possible worlds, there is no such thing a perfect metal for pots.”
We expect many things of a good pan, and not all of them are to be found in a single material. First and foremost, it should be highly conductive, so that it heats food quickly and distributes heat evenly across the base (no hot spots!). It should balance well in the hand and be light and easy to maneuver on the stove top, with a handle you can use without burning yourself. But we also want it to be dense and solid enough to withstand high heat without buckling, chipping, or
cracking. The ideal pan should have a surface that is nonreactive, nonstick, noncorrosive, easy to clean, and long lasting. It should have a pretty shape and sit well on the burner. Oh, and it shouldn’t cost a fortune. Over and above all this, a truly great pot has some quality—impossible to quantify—that makes it not just functional but lovable: Hello, old friend, you think, as you haul it out once again.
Traditionally, cookbooks started with a list of equipment required. As the author runs through the range of materials from which a pan might be constructed, there is a constant air of ambivalence, of “Yes, but . . . ” Ceramic, for example, is great until it cracks. Ditto, glass ovenware or Pyrex, which is fine in the oven but fragile over a flame. Aluminum is good for omelettes, but you can’t put acidic foods in it. Silver is said to be excellent except for the deluxe price tag (and the subsequent pain when it is lost or stolen); but silver-cooked foods taste of tarnish unless the pans are kept scrupulously clean. Heavy black cast-iron pans are the favorites of many cooks. Cast-iron vessels have been used for hundreds of years and are still the choice for such homely dishes as tarte tatin in France and cornbread in the United States. “Put on the skillet, put on the lead / Mamma’s goin‘ to make a little shortnin’ bread,” sings Paul Robeson. If well seasoned, a cast-iron skillet has excellent nonstick properties, and because it is so heavy, it can withstand the high heat needed for searing. The downside is that these pans rust nastily if not dried and oiled carefully after use. They also leach small amounts of iron into the food (though this is a benefit if you are anemic).
The solution to many of these drawbacks was enameled cast iron: cast iron coated in a vitreous enamel glaze, the most famous example of which is Le Creuset. The principle of enameling is very ancient : the Egyptians and the Greeks made enameled jewelry, fusing powdered glass onto pottery beads by firing it at very high temperatures (1382°F to 1560°F). Enameling began to be applied to iron and steel around 1850. Then in 1925, two Belgian industrialists working in northern France thought of applying it to cast-iron cookware, the bedrock of every French grandmother’s kitchen. Armand Desaegher
was a cast-metal expert. Octave Aubecq knew about enameling. Together, they produced one of the definitive ranges of cookware of the twentieth century, starting with a round cocotte (we would call it a casserole) and moving over the years into ramekins and baking dishes, French ovens and tagines, roasters and woks, flan dishes and grill pans. Part of the appeal of Le Creuset cookware is the colors, which mark changing tastes in kitchen design: Flame Orange in the 1930s; Elysees Yellow in the 1950s; Blue in the 1960s (the color was suggested by Elizabeth David, inspired by a pack of Gauloises cigarettes) ; and Teal, Cerise, and Granite today. I have a couple in Almond (a fancy name for cream) and there is nothing better for long, slow-cooked casseroles, because the cast iron warms up evenly and retains heat superbly, while the enamel stops your stew from taking on any metallic flavors. Mostly, they score high on lovability; the sight of one on the stove makes the heart sing.
One of the best cooks I know (my mother-in-law) does all her cooking in blue Le Creuset. She was Cordon Bleu trained before she got
We expect many things of a good pan, and not all of them are to be found in a single material. First and foremost, it should be highly conductive, so that it heats food quickly and distributes heat evenly across the base (no hot spots!). It should balance well in the hand and be light and easy to maneuver on the stove top, with a handle you can use without burning yourself. But we also want it to be dense and solid enough to withstand high heat without buckling, chipping, or
cracking. The ideal pan should have a surface that is nonreactive, nonstick, noncorrosive, easy to clean, and long lasting. It should have a pretty shape and sit well on the burner. Oh, and it shouldn’t cost a fortune. Over and above all this, a truly great pot has some quality—impossible to quantify—that makes it not just functional but lovable: Hello, old friend, you think, as you haul it out once again.
Traditionally, cookbooks started with a list of equipment required. As the author runs through the range of materials from which a pan might be constructed, there is a constant air of ambivalence, of “Yes, but . . . ” Ceramic, for example, is great until it cracks. Ditto, glass ovenware or Pyrex, which is fine in the oven but fragile over a flame. Aluminum is good for omelettes, but you can’t put acidic foods in it. Silver is said to be excellent except for the deluxe price tag (and the subsequent pain when it is lost or stolen); but silver-cooked foods taste of tarnish unless the pans are kept scrupulously clean. Heavy black cast-iron pans are the favorites of many cooks. Cast-iron vessels have been used for hundreds of years and are still the choice for such homely dishes as tarte tatin in France and cornbread in the United States. “Put on the skillet, put on the lead / Mamma’s goin‘ to make a little shortnin’ bread,” sings Paul Robeson. If well seasoned, a cast-iron skillet has excellent nonstick properties, and because it is so heavy, it can withstand the high heat needed for searing. The downside is that these pans rust nastily if not dried and oiled carefully after use. They also leach small amounts of iron into the food (though this is a benefit if you are anemic).
The solution to many of these drawbacks was enameled cast iron: cast iron coated in a vitreous enamel glaze, the most famous example of which is Le Creuset. The principle of enameling is very ancient : the Egyptians and the Greeks made enameled jewelry, fusing powdered glass onto pottery beads by firing it at very high temperatures (1382°F to 1560°F). Enameling began to be applied to iron and steel around 1850. Then in 1925, two Belgian industrialists working in northern France thought of applying it to cast-iron cookware, the bedrock of every French grandmother’s kitchen. Armand Desaegher
was a cast-metal expert. Octave Aubecq knew about enameling. Together, they produced one of the definitive ranges of cookware of the twentieth century, starting with a round cocotte (we would call it a casserole) and moving over the years into ramekins and baking dishes, French ovens and tagines, roasters and woks, flan dishes and grill pans. Part of the appeal of Le Creuset cookware is the colors, which mark changing tastes in kitchen design: Flame Orange in the 1930s; Elysees Yellow in the 1950s; Blue in the 1960s (the color was suggested by Elizabeth David, inspired by a pack of Gauloises cigarettes) ; and Teal, Cerise, and Granite today. I have a couple in Almond (a fancy name for cream) and there is nothing better for long, slow-cooked casseroles, because the cast iron warms up evenly and retains heat superbly, while the enamel stops your stew from taking on any metallic flavors. Mostly, they score high on lovability; the sight of one on the stove makes the heart sing.
One of the best cooks I know (my mother-in-law) does all her cooking in blue Le Creuset. She was Cordon Bleu trained before she got
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