Skillet Love

INTRODUCTION

A Timeless Classic

MY LOVE AFFAIR with cast iron did not begin forty years ago when I bought an old 12-inch Griswold at an Atlanta estate sale. Someone had cared for that ebony-black skillet. Someone had fried chicken in it. Made cornbread, too. It was shiny and smooth, with no hint of rust or neglect.

I adopted it into my family of pots and pans, and it moved with us from Atlanta to Nashville, and in between was crated and shipped to and from England, where it roasted lamb and potatoes for friends. No matter the kitchen, and no matter the occasion, my skillet fit in, segueing from anniversary dinners of seared salmon to Saturday pancakes with kids.

And yet, I never showered it with praise. That was reserved for the French copper pans I brought back from cooking school in Paris. You could say that this humble iron skillet with the perfect patina had been like a relief player, waiting for the one recipe to get my attention.

Then one July afternoon two years ago, I grabbed the skillet on a whim and poured in a favorite pound cake batter. That cake rose to a glorious height. The crust on top was golden and crackly, and the interior crumb was even and smooth. I had never baked such a perfect pound cake. My skillet, practiced and ready, performed like a seasoned pro and knocked that cake out of the park. In that instant, I fell in love. Yes, in love with my skillet.

It should have been sooner, because I was made for the efficiency of cast iron. Give me a sharp knife and a decent cutting board, and I am ready to cook. I prep many recipes with just a bowl and a wooden spoon. The cast-iron skillet is that same sort of basic tool.

Plus, raising children and being concerned about their health as well as my own, I should have given the iron skillet credit for being naturally nonstick. Unlike the artificial nonstick surfaces on many pans that cannot be placed over high heat lest they impart harmful chemicals into our food, the iron skillet begs for high heat. It is iron, for goodness’ sake, forged at extreme heat so you can safely crank up the stove or oven and let the pan get seriously hot to sear, sizzle, roast, fry, blister, bake, braise, and caramelize, introducing big, bold, restaurant-quality flavors in the process.

I’ve spent a lifetime reading about, listening to, and interviewing famous chefs. I have quizzed them on the little details that make a recipe better. I remembered Lydie Marshall’s suggestion in a cooking class decades ago when she advocated cast-iron skillets instead of copper. While writing this book, I tracked down Lydie in the South of France and asked her via email why someone so knowledgeable about French cooking chose iron over copper. Her answer was simple: Cast-iron pans are more affordable.

And therein lies another attribute: The cast-iron skillet is the pan of the everyday. You might desire copper or stainless steel, but you can afford cast iron. It is no-frills and authentic. It is for starting out and paring down. It is the only pan you ever need. And it works with you wherever you are on the timeline of life because it is wonderfully vintage and also modern and relevant. It bakes fruit pies, crostatas, cobblers, and pound cakes with rustic beauty. It sears tuna to perfection. It roasts mussels, corn on the cob, even cashews. It produces crisp-sided no-knead breads and pizzas that taste as if they were baked in a wood-fired oven. And on weeknights, it is a time saver because you can pile the entire meal into it, leaving only one pan to wash.

This book, Skillet Love, is my salute to the timeless, sustainable 12-inch cast-iron skillet. I’m not alone in my adoration, as there are collectors and devotees around the globe. But this is my deep dive, and I share recipes, advice, discoveries, and musings in the hopes you will pull out your skillet right now and not wait forty years to fall in love with it.

THE TEN PRINCIPLES OF CAST-IRON COOKING: UNDERSTANDING THE MAGIC

People might have originally cooked with cast iron because it was the only pan available, but today we have options. I wanted to understand why this skillet makes our food taste good so that we can be intentional about cooking with it.

If you take away one thing from this book, it should be that the cast-iron skillet allows you to cook boldly. Big flavors are achieved by a number of techniques and tricks, but the most important is high heat. The next time you dine out and look into the open kitchen at your favorite restaurant, you will likely see fire and flame. You will hear sizzling, and you will smell char. In the world of food science, that means flavor.

When steaks, fish fillets, or pork chops hit a hot pan, their proteins immediately stick to the pan, but after a while, the food releases and reveals a crust. That crust seals in flavors. It’s the same principle in baking. The crisp exterior of a cake baked in iron allows the inside to be delicate and tender. High heat and hot sears are made possible with cast iron because the skillet can be heated dry without cracking, warping, or burning. It loves heat.

Here are my ten discoveries about why food cooked in a cast-iron skillet tastes so good:

1. The Hot Sear: Steaks, Chops, and Fish

When you cook a steak or chop, let the skillet heat up on the stove or in the oven before you add the meat. That way, the skillet soaks up all the heat and retains it so that when the food hits the pan, it sears.

Let’s be honest—cast-iron skillets are not the best at heating evenly. That’s because the thermal conductivity, or how it transfers heat within the pan, is low. But these skillets are the best at retaining heat—better than carbon steel pans—so even when cold steaks are added to the hot iron pan, the skillet temperature stays hot enough to sear. You just need to preheat that pan on top of the stove or in the oven. Use the heaviest iron skillet you’ve got, because it retains even more heat. And if you are really serious about searing, heat two skillets for steak: one to sear the first side, and the second hot skillet ready to sear the second. It’s important to leave the food untouched for several minutes while it sears. This allows the juices to be locked in and the seasoning on the outside to char.

That’s it!

Well, one more thing: Searing in cast iron is a little like Cinderella going to the ball and needing to be gone before the stroke of midnight. When your gorgeous steak is perfectly seared to doneness and doesn’t need further cooking, you’ve got to quickly sweep that steak out of the pan and onto a plate or it will overcook from the skillet’s residual heat—what remains after the stove is turned off. Use this remaining heat in the skillet to simmer a quick pan sauce to pour over the steak on the plate. More on that in discovery #10.

2. Stir-Fry: Just Like a Wok

Cast-iron skillets can be used to replicate Chinese takeout in your kitchen, so choose a skillet with the deepest walls. You will need the pan depth to toss around ingredients and keep them moving so they stir-fry (thus, the name). Stir-fry works in cast iron because the skillet can get hot enough, needs just a tablespoon of oil, and the ingredients cook quickly.

To begin, prep all your ingredients, making sure they are chopped about the same size so they cook in about the same amount of time. Heat the skillet over medium-high heat. Add about a tablespoon of peanut oil, which has the highest smoke point of the oils, or your favorite neutral vegetable oil. Add your seasonings, like grated fresh ginger or minced garlic. Keep everything moving by stirring so it does not burn. Add the veggies and stir-fry, then remove them and add your protein—shrimp, scallops, thinly sliced chicken, lean pork, or beef, or tofu cubes. Stir-fry no more than 12 ounces at a time so the food fries but does not steam. Remove the protein, add the sauce and let it cook down a bit, and then throw everything back in the skillet for a good stir.

The benefits of stir-frying regularly are a happy family, a healthy diet, and a skillet with a deep, black, well-seasoned glow.

3. Dry-Roast: From Nuts to Pizza

When you heat the skillet and then add food without any fat, you are dry-roasting. This is the method used by the wives of the Brittany fishermen hundreds of years ago to cook fresh mussels. It also works for roasting nuts of all types—cashews, pecans, walnuts, and even peanuts in the shell.

Dry-roasting also improves the crust on pizza and breads like English muffins. In the case of pizza, you first dust the hot skillet with a little cornmeal before adding the dough. This is a bread-baking trick used in wood-fired ovens. If the cornmeal turns golden brown when it hits the pan, the pan is hot enough to add the pizza dough. The pizza bakes crispy on the bottom and is done in 12 to 15 minutes.

Another benefit of dry-roasting is that there is little cleanup. In most cases you can simply wipe the skillet clean with a damp paper towel.

4. Roast with Oil: Bring on the Vegetables

Anyone who uses their skillet day in and day out to feed the family has most likely roasted with oil. You heat up the skillet, add a little olive oil and some chopped vegetables or meat, and place the pan in the oven. It couldn’t be easier or more successful.

The process works because the oil acts as a barrier, at first preventing the food from sticking to the skillet. As the heat of the oven extracts moisture from the vegetables or meat, they begin to stick to the skillet, and this becomes that delicious seared flavor.

I can’t think of a vegetable that isn’t improved by roasting in oil in cast iron. Before serving, sprinkle on your favorite salt and freshly ground black pepper, or maybe a handful of chopped fresh herbs, or a teaspoon of grated lemon zest. You taste the vegetable, you get these amazing compliments, and you know it was the skillet that did the work. You can also roast cubes of chicken or fish for salads or curries, or slices of steak for paninis. Again, heat the pan first, add the oil, and then add the food.

As to what oil is best, use olive oil or the vegetable oil you like best for cooking. But beware of butter, for it will burn and can taste bitter. Ghee—or clarified butter—is a better choice.

5. Sear, Then Braise: Create a Skillet Supper

Using the skillet as the one pan that cooks it all might seem new, but it’s really an old and trusted technique of searing and then braising. Your grandmother knew it would gently cook tough but flavorful cuts of meat. Today, we apply this method to cooking most anything. You heat the skillet, add a little oil, and first sear your proteins that need some time to cook, such as bone-in chicken, steaks, or fish fillets, then remove them. The exceptions are foods that cook quickly, such as shrimp or scallops—they are instead added near the end of the process.

Then you add flavors to the hot pan, like onion and garlic and ginger and let them cook. Next, you deglaze and scrape, adding wine, beer, or stock to the skillet and scraping up the bottom of the pan to release the bits of cooked food and flavor. Next, add your veggies, like fresh or frozen peas, chopped green beans, asparagus spears, or zucchini strips, and let them cook. The protein is then returned to the skillet—or, in the case of shrimp and scallops, everything in the skillet is moved to the side to make room for them to cook on their own in a bare area.

You can get a lot more elaborate and braise shanks of lamb, thick pork chops and roasts, and whole chickens. But you will need a lid for these longer-cooking recipes—either tempered glass or cast iron.

6. Fry: Why Grandma’s Skillet Still Looks Good Today

It’s no secret how the black patina developed on an heirloom skillet. It fried chicken! Oil is the best friend to the skillet. It keeps it protected, impervious to any moisture that might cause it to rust. Think of oil on a skillet like moisturizer on your skin. Frying is the direct route to a gorgeous jet-black skillet. Heat plus oil builds the patina and makes your skillet naturally nonstick.

And while health experts say we should not exist on a diet of fried food, treats such as skillet-fried chicken or homemade doughnuts are worthy splurges. The chicken I fry in cast iron is life changing. I don’t fry it every day, nor even once a week. But when I do, my husband smiles. It is the fried chicken he remembers from childhood. With just one bite he is instantly transported back to his mother’s kitchen in Chattanooga.

The iron skillet is able to fry so well and create these strong memories because it is heavy, retains heat, and is durable. You don’t need an electric fryer. You just need your skillet, oil, and heat.

7. Bake: From Sticky Buns to Tarte Tatin

It was a pound cake recipe that opened my eyes to the possibilities awaiting us with the iron skillet. You, too, can adapt your favorite cake, bread, and pie recipes to the 12-inch skillet, and it’s a fun process.

The easiest cakes to adapt are those that are sturdy. The Cast-Iron Pound Cake (here) and other cakes with structure and substance can bake to doneness inside while the outside develops a delicious crust. You can serve them right out of the skillet, or in the case of the Brown Sugar Birthday Cake (here), unmold, pour over a quick icing, and light the candles. And then there is Fresh Pineapple Upside-Down Cake (here), the most famous cake cooked in cast iron. It works because the flavors of brown sugar and pineapple caramelize on the bottom of the skillet; when inverted, this canopy of flavor trickles down into the moist cake underneath. Before they were called upside-down cakes, they were just known as skillet cakes.