Right before you go shopping for a pan, in a niche cookware shop or a department store, you know it is going to make you helpless, you know the selection is going to shock you, that the variety can't possibly make your decision any easier, and for a moment you are rather jealous of your grandmother that had an easy time as she only had a single fry pan (until you remember how hard it was to clean that one frying pan and you are once again motivated to go out shopping). There is a huge variety of shapes, material, coatings, and you need to also, at the same time keep in mind what YOU like, what YOUR needs are, what makes YOU comfortable in a kitchen, and what YOU can afford. Materials The basic fry pan materials are in Stainless Steel, Cast (Iron or Aluminum- plain or Hard Anodized) and Copper, which is usually more expensive. A good solution is the combination between a couple of materials- such as the three layer Stainless Steel pots where both outer layers are a hard, resistant Stainless Steel yet the middle layer is a heat conducting efficient Copper or Aluminum. Since Aluminum is cheap pans are usually economical, but take care as they will be relatively "soft" so they can bend it they fall or get hit, you can invest a bit more in Hard Anodized (an Electrolyzed Aluminum) that is much harder (yet still relatively economical) all Aluminum frying pans will have a non stick coating on it since cooking directly on Aluminum is not very recommended. Aluminum is a great heat conductor (but it does cool down fast once removed from the heat source). A comment about coatings- some are sold as naturally manufactured and "Green" yet there have been comments saying they are a bit less efficient than older non-stick coat versions, in general if the coat is unscratched and pan is used according to manufacturer's instructions, my personal opinion is that you can use any non stick coat, but the environmental factor does sometimes mean the we work harder today to create a brighter tomorrow. Use non metallic tools on any coating you use and store carefully so the coat will not scratch and will live longer, but remember- a coat, no matter how good, is still an external coat, not the material itself, and it will at some point, wear off. Cast iron frying pans are very special, and are, on the one hand, some of the most durable fry pans offered, and when the entire pan is cast iron, it can with great ease be used in ovens. But on the other hand are very delicate and should be handled with care when stored (Rust, a big turnoff). They are optimal for a limited range of recipes and cannot replace a simple general use fry pan for all your frying needs. Size Frying pans can be found in any size between 10cm- 4 inch and 36cm- 14 inch, a general use fry pan should be about 26 cm - 10 inch, in diameter, that will be comfortable with a scrambled egg for 4 people and a few sausages. Heating an oversized pan is comfortable but is costly as you waste energy heating a surface you will not use, also not using the entire surfaces might result in temperature differences on the surface cold spots. Handle and Knob Most frying pans do not have a lid, if one is important for you- consider getting a saut? pan that will have a lid but will probably be quite wider and deeper than other pans. A glass lid is comfortable for looking in but it limits the temperature of an oven the pan can be placed in, as do handle materials such as wood or Bakelite. If putting the pan in the oven is something you use often, consider a fry pan that has a lid and handle from the same materials as the body. A reasonable selection would have 3 sizes of Aluminum coated pans, a cast iron medium sized pan, a bigger Stainless Steel saut? pan and a large wok. That would fill your basic needs.
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