I have a set of 3 Bra Premiere non-stick frying pans that I’ve used for a while. The coating on them says “Teflon Innovations without PFOA”. Recently I’ve noticed that on the most used pan, the 26cm one, the Teflon coating has started to peel off.
I know that Teflon coatings can release harmful fumes and chemicals if overheated, but what about if the coating is physically peeling? Is it still safe to cook with them? Or should I stop using especially the 26cm one? I don’t want to keep exposing my family to anything dangerous unknowingly. Any advice if these types of pans are still safe to cook with if the nonstick surface is peeling would be appreciated!
Do you want to eat teflon? 'Cause that’s how you end up eating teflon.
In theory, the teflon should continue to be inert as it passes through your digestive tract, but don’t do that. It’s time to throw out the pan.
Related advice: non-stick is overrated to begin with. Replace all your nonstick pans with tri-ply stainless clad aluminum, cast iron (enameled or not), carbon steel, etc…
If you insist on having a teflon pan, recognize it for the semi-disposable item it is: get the cheapest one you can find, use it only for things that really need it (e.g. eggs), and accept that you’re going to be throwing it out and replacing it every couple of years.
non-stick is overrated to begin with
I’d say it’s correctly rated. It does the no-stick well while not being as durable. In my experience that’s what people expect from it.
I’ve never known anyone in real life who owns Teflon cookware who thinks it’s a concern in any way. If they saw any issue with their 15 year old teflon skillet, it’s that it visually looks bad from all the scratches
That’s because most people didn’t realize they start shedding microplastics after the coating is damaged and you keep cooking with it until pretty recently.
The main issue from Teflon is the manufacture of Teflon
Making that stuff makes some gnarly byproducts
The Teflon it’s is relatively safe as long as you keep it under like 220C, if it gets too hot it will start breaking down and releasing some gnarly gas
I mean, I never cared to know more, when in 2001 someone told me that I’d be eating chemicals if I used metal utensils with non stick. I never needed or wanted proof that was bad. Other than having to explain this several times, it’s never caused me any issue just to not do it. Using different cookware or a wooden spoon is quite a low effort fix.
I’ve found that time and again, when I explain this, people almost act like I’m stupid for caring to take this tiny precaution. I’ve always found it really weird to need hard evidence before taking easy precautions which cost little to nothing… Like people who smoked until it was proven to cause cancer. It was pretty fucking obvious to anyone couple years into adulthood and paying attention… that shit was bad for you.
The one concern is that cheaper ones get ruined real fast, that’s why all cooking groups hate them (but people also keep buying them because cheap and convenient).
No stick but not durable seems to be the consensus I’ve seen and that’s, yeah that’s what it is.
The one concern is that cheaper ones get ruined real fast
Expensive ones get ruined real fast, too. There’s no point in buying expensive teflon cookware; it all wears out at the same rate, so the fancy stuff is just a rip-off.
Oh. I’ve had much better experience with more expensive ones. At least in my use they seem to survive better.
I don’t have personal experience with it myself; all I know is that experts (e.g. America’s Test Kitchen, who test pans regularly, and Alton Brown, who wrote a book on what pans to own) tend to recommend cheaper pans.
Hard to argue with that. Maybe I’ve just been lucky
I learned that the biggest difference between cheap and expensive non stick pans is basically the amount of non stick coatings. Regardless, the non stick coating will wear off over time. This was the conclusion from a documentary I once watched on whether it was more economical to bit a cheap pan every so often or an expensive pan less often.
Personally I would strongly recommend cast iron from a reputable brand or carbon steel if you can afford it. Stainless steel also works, but is more tricky to not stick. Cast iron is heavier, but very forgiving and will last you a generation or more.
The non-sticks are usually cheap and require minimal effort. Carbon steel could be a cool alternative though
I’ve looked into this when buying pans, I’d say it’s still unsafe. Apparently in 2013 they changed their formulation so the chemicals aren’t toxic and if ingested it’s inert so it doesn’t affect you at all.
With all that, I still don’t trust non-stick and bought myself a stainless steel pan and I love it. It’s easy to maintain and when cooking properly most things don’t really stick either.
Would you have resources or advice about cooking properly on a stainless steel pan ?
Preheat the empty pan. You’ll know it’s hot enough when you throw water droplets on and it beads and dances around. Depending on the pan and situation, they’re pretty sensitive to heat so youd mainly cook on a low or medium.
Then use a good amount of oil and/or butter. I’ve even cooked eggs without much hassle.
You often need less heat than you think. Use oil. Pretty much everything should cook better in a stainless with a little bit of learning curve, except eggs.* Yes, even fish. Keep steel wool and barkeeper’s friend handy for scrubbing them back to a shiny polish.
*Cook eggs in a non stick that you use for basically nothing but eggs.
Preheat and use a decent amount of oil
Also try not to load it with a lot of food. I sometimes need to, and when I do, it seems to cool the pan a bit and the food starts to stick. I normally just raise the heat a bit.
There is an episode of the Dave Chang show podcast that covers this. They have a professor on to cover the science of different pans. If I remember correctly, it should be safe as it will through your digestive system. The bigger issue is overheating Teflon. That being said, you still don’t really want non food in your food, and that pan is likely pretty worthless from a non-stick perspective
My girlfriend is a materials scientist specialising in non-stick coatings.
The first time she came to my house, I had to throw away all teflon with even a scratch on it. She said once the surface is broken it will leach chemicals into your food.
She said they are perfectly safe whilst the coating is in tact and uses non-stick pans herself. Just replace them as soon as you notice the surface is broken.
Just replace them as soon as you notice the surface is broken.
So like twice a month?
Don’t use metal on your pans maybe?
No, it’s toxic. Replace it with carbon steel, stainless steel, or cast iron.
I got tired of seeing my teflon-coated pans wear out like that or lose their non-stickiness, it bothered me to realize that the ‘premium cookware’ I was buying was temporary trash I’d need to replace every couple of years.
I retired my teflon cookware and now have just steel and cast iron (and ceramic-coated cast iron) and I don’t miss teflon-coated cookware at all.
Sure, sometimes I end up with stuff stuck to my pans, but realistically that was true with my ‘non-stick’ pans as well. The nice thing about cast iron and steel is that with use, they seem to get better, whereas the teflon pans start out nice but deteriorate in the way they work. When I do end up with stuff stuck to the pan, I can scrub that clean in a few seconds with a steel scrubber or scraper, whereas stuck-on stuff with teflon (the stuff the dishwasher didn’t get, anyhow), seemed to demand the extra-soft scrubber (and lots of time, because the soft scrubber doesn’t work as well).
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Did you know that if you use Teflon pans in a house with pet birds they might die from the fumes? Since we historically used canaries to detect dangerous gasses in coal mines, might we take that as an indication that Teflon pans should not be used at all?
The scratched ones are bad and should not be used. Going forward you should ditch all your nonstick pans and buy cast iron or stainless steel.
FWIW seasoning a cast iron can kill birds too. So can the fumes frommicrowave popcorn.
I couldn’t find any sources for this. Do you have any?
“Safe” is a relative term. Is it going to set your house on fire? No. Is it going to release harmful gasses while you cook and leech toxic metals into your food and slowly poison you? Yeah, probably. But, like, how old are you? Maybe you’re like 98 years old and don’t have that much longer to live anyway.
Fuck’s smatterchew? Throw that shit out and get a new pan. Damn.
I think generally it’s considered safe apart from the gases, but that’s an issue if you heat it to a much too high of a temperature. And it seems like they make you feel sick but it passes in few hours.
I have never heard anyone manage to get that though. Maybe if you forget the pan on the stove, but then you wouldn’t be standing there breathing the fumes? I dunno
My stainless steel cookware set has worked better and lasted longer than every non-stick pan I have ever owned.
Ugh… I’ve tried this route… I really have, but shit like eggs sticking like a mother fucker is just too annoying. Unless you drench the pan in oil.
I’ve switched to ceramic non-stick, I’m sure it’s not perfect either but you gotta make compromises.
I’ve dedicated myself to figuring this out. It’s not that you have to drench it in oil, but there needs to be enough to cover the pan.
The most important part though is that the pan is heated up enough when you crack eggs on it. And give the eggs a little bit of time to cook before flipping them.
It takes a lot of practice and you’re going to be eating scrambled eggs instead of fried eggs for a while. But keep at it.
There is a Goldilocks temperature with stainless for cooking eggs. Too hot or too cold and it sticks. I had the ritual down before COVID, where I would turn the pan on and prep my coffee while it heated up to the perfect temp.
This, so much this. The eggs need to cook long enough to the bottom of the pan to then release themselves. Cooking temp is super important here.
It sounds like ya’ll are over cooking your eggs… At least for my taste.
I’ve baked eggs on stainless for a while, best advice I have is to get the eggs out of the fridge like 15 mins before you bake them. That way the temperature difference is less when they hit the pan. The same goes for baking eggs in any other type of pan.
Fish, now that takes practice and patience.
Eggs are indeed tricky on the stainless. I have found that ceramic or a well-seasoned cast iron pan is a lot better for eggs if you aren’t good at hitting that exact temperature that they need to be at to cook and release on their own with just a minimal amount of oil/butter. My parents have a single teflon pan that is just for eggs, but they cook eggs so frequently that they need to replace it all the time because it starts to peel and flake in no time flat.
Have a ceramic pan dedicated for sticky stuff that doesn’t need to be cooked too hot. Ceramic that is not used on high heat lasts a long time. Obviously with wood of silicone utensils.
Well-seasoned, smooth bottomed cast iron or carbon steel can be great egg pans. There’s a learning curve but IMO the maintenance isn’t as daunting as many think.
I’ve got a de Buyer carbon steel pan that we use for eggs most mornings; it doesn’t perform identically to a Teflon pan but it’s still very very good. Maintenance is just (1) a drop of oil before the food goes in, (2) quick wipe under the faucet with a dish brush, and (3) dry with a dish cloth before putting away. I’ve had the pan for almost 10 years now and there’s no reason it shouldn’t last the rest of my life (and then some).
You might be cooking to hot, I use cast iron so I can’t speak directly about steel but low and slow is best for eggs on cast iron.
Just use cast iron at that point. Season it well enough and it’ll be smoother than any nonstick you can buy
Unless you drench the pan in oil.
Nah, you can develop technique to prevent this. What’s great is on stainless you can use a stainless turner as well. When it comes to eggs it’s all about adding enough butter to cover the bottom of the pan and then keeping the egg moving after the initial side is cooked enough to release.
Omelettes are the same on stainless. You just have to keep things moving. It requires a little more technique and attention but IMO that’s better than having a side of Teflon flakes with breakfast.
I would rather deal with the (often exaggerated) care of a cast iron pan than deal with non-stick Teflon or similar. And have. But stainless steel is a comfortable favorite for common jobs like cooking soup or quickly frying an egg or two. Light, easy to clean, and practice usually means it won’t stick if you know how to grease a pan and keep the temperature right.
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Don’t heat a non-stick on high, like ever. Medium is as high as they can take.
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Use silicon utensils.
We had issues until we stopped doing #1. The cheap non-stick Tfals we have now have lasted 10+ years. The old expensive ones didn’t make it past the first few.
*silicone. You wouldn’t want silicon utensils.
lol. Fair correction.
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once you go cast iron you never go back
- Cast iron = brilliant and last forever
- Stainless steel = brilliant and last for ages
- Carbon steel = brilliant and last for ages (but expensive)
Cooking on plastic doesn’t feel right. Even if it’s perfectly safe, I’m happy to stick with any of the above and not cause excess waste by having to throw out pans when they scratch.
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It says that’s steel, not cast iron. Cast iron and carbon steel (which that tray does not claim to be) benefit from seasoning with oil. As far as I know, regular steel does not.
That said, still weird that it rusted. Should be stainless steel which shouldn’t rust.
I’d bet it’s carbon steel my pizza steel is and needs some fresh seasoning every year or so. Brillo pads and peanut oil has always worked well for me.
Ignore all the comments in this thread, mate. Everything is different in the EU, and you’re getting advice from Americans, who have zero consumer rights against being poisoned 😂
Do Europeans not have cast iron?
Jesus Christ mate, we invented it
I had no idea China was member of the EU these days.
Edit: since sarcasm is a little too subtle for you, considering your last comment, I’ll spell it out for you, mate. Obviously, EU has cast iron, stainless, and carbon steel, everywhere does it’s not new. I’m making fun of you for suggesting that because the advice is from Americans it’s inherently bad advice, when this thread is advising tried and true cookwares as the better choice to nonstick disposables. Go find a comment thread that’s advocating for another fisher price landfill destined pan if you want that hot take to have any value and not make you look like a lost xenophobic asshole. And while you’re fucking off, go sit on your European exceptionalism; cast iron was invented in China at least a thousand years before eu guys figured it out.
Oo angry 😤 😂
Good luck with those billy goats, watch out for the big one.
Replace ‘em. Get either cast iron or stainless steel, once both are seasoned properly they are just as non-stick as teflon pans and much more durable. Lodge cast iron pans are like $20 and are super easy to take care of if you cook frequently.
I don’t think stainless steal seasons. Maybe you’re thinking of carbon steel?
Stainless is great to cook with but you have to wait for the pans to come to temp before adding food
Nothing is nonstick like Teflon … But the VAST majority of cooking doesn’t require that level of nonstick, either.
Unless you have a French omelette addiction, you probably don’t need Teflon.
- Chunks of teflon are getting in your food
- The aluminium underneath, which was protected by the teflon, is getting into your food (especially true with acidic foods, since they will react with aluminium and erode it).
I don’t know that the PTFE is going to be any worse than all the other micro plastic we’re eating*, but the aluminum definitely is a problem.
Id suggest replacing it (or using the others until you can replace it,)
Tomorrow might be a good time if you can afford it, with all the sales.
*ain’t life grand?
There was that town in the US where 3M dumped PTFE into the rivers and it made it into the drinking water, I watched a documentary where people in that town have a cancer rate 169 times the national average. IIRC
PTFE is one of the greatest chemicals to ingest… if you want to grow some extra body parts.
I think you might be thinking about this
Perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA), a chemical formerly used in the manufacture of PTFE products such as non-stick coated cookware, can be carcinogenic for people who are exposed to it (see Ecotoxicity).[66] Concerning levels of PFOA have been found in the blood of people who work in or live near factories where the chemical is used, and in people regularly exposed to PFOA-containing products such as some ski waxes and stain-resistant fabric coatings, but non-stick cookware was not found to be a major source of exposure, as the PFOA is burned off during the manufacturing process and not present in the finished product.[64] Non-stick coated cookware has not been manufactured using PFOA since 2013,[67] and PFOA is no longer being made in the United States.[66]
Shouldn’t be used anymore
PTFE is one of the greatest chemicals to ingest… if you want to grow some extra body parts.
Actually ingesting teflon “chips” (hah) shouldn’t do anything. It should just pass through without interacting with your body. Not a pleasant thought, eating them, but shouldn’t have any harmful effects either.
That’s the stuff, serves me right for only half paying attention to a documentary. Either way I’ll probably steer clear of Teflon pans in future.
I did try to find ScotchGuard a few years ago when I got a new Sofa (Couch for the Americans) and I found it was discontinued because it was probably just PFOA in a spray bottle :)
why does it look like a very old whale who’s battled hundreds of squids? Ever hear of wood or silicone utensils?
Teflon is very bad for you don’t do it.
