The non-stick pans are very useful kitchen tools. Until you improperly use this handy cookware, they never get ruined.
Most of the time, we use non-stick cooking sets to prepare healthy recipes.
No, matter whether you cook a meal for breakfast or dinner.
But, if you overly heated up the pan or scrub with a hard scrubber, the coating will get ruined. Consequently, never immerse the hot pan under regular soapy water.
The common syndromes that can give you an indication of a non-stick pan start ruining –
- If the food test starts changing.
- Foods get stuck on it, even if cooking at a lower temperature.
- The inner core metal comes visible.
- The non-stick coating starts taking-off, or it becomes discolored.
- You found changes in the food test.
There are multiple types of nonstick-pan present on the market. Apart from the Teflon non-stick cookware, there are 5 types of non-stick pans are available on the market.
Hard anodized & porcelain ceramic coated pans are the healthiest cookware for low & medium heat cooking.
Well, seasoned cast-iron & carbon steel pans are also considered as non-stick cookware. They are perfect for high heat cooking.
However, a cast-iron or carbon steel cookware gets ruined if its seasoning coating gets damaged & catches the rusts.
How Non Stick Pans Gets Ruined?
The non-stick pans can be ruined, due to several reasons. Teflon pans get ruined quickly as compared to other non-stick pans. Let’s discuss the causes one by one-
Due To Over Heating:
Any non-stick pan can be peeling off due to overheating. Even if the cookware is dishwasher safe & compatible with metallic utensils, never use them for high heat recipes.
Hard anodized pans are oven safe till medium-high heat temperature. But, most of the Teflon pans are thermal safe till 350F.
During overheating, Teflon cookware evaporates chemical fumes, which is highly toxic for us.
Other non-stick cookware like anodized, ceramic & granite coated pans coating gets flake off. However, chemical fumes of porcelain ceramic coated cookware are less harmful; compared to Teflon one.
The hard anodized coating is a natural, safe non-stick coating. If this layer gets peeled off, foods come in contact with casted aluminum. That is unsafe for us.
Teflon evaporating fumes are unsafe for whole bio-diversities, including humans, birds & animals also.
If you use non-stick pans for oven cooking, strictly follow the manufacturer guidelines.
Related: How to tell if your pan is oven safe?
Usage Of Wrong Cooking Utensils:
Teflon or anodized coating is very thin, in nature. With a little pressure metallic spatulas, sharp edges easily take off this coating.
On the other hand, ceramic & granite coating is protected with glazes. That’s why they look so glossy. This coating also can be ruined by metallic utensils.
Once if these coatings get damaged, foods start to stick on the pans. Sometimes you can also face mineral leaching issues, especially if the base metal is aluminum or carbon steel made.
Modern hybrid pans & titanium non-stick cookware are a bit more different. Hybrid pans constructed on stainless steel base metal. And both of these pans or pots are compatible with metallic utensils.
Over Uses Dishwasher:
Most of the dishwasher soaps are the enemies of non-stick cookware. These detergents contain some corrosives or abrasives; that slowly ruined the smoothness of non-stick pans.
On the other hand, extreme water also damages the Teflon & ceramic/granite coating.
However, you can still use the dishwasher with some little tweaks. First, replace the detergent with baking soda & control the water temperature.
Baking soda & warm water are the most effective solution to pull out burnt foods from the pan surface.
Related: How safe are non-stick pans for dishwasher cleaning?
Improperly Keeps The Cookware:
Yes, the coating might get scratched; if you don’t know how to keeps the non-stick cooking sets safely.
Three simple cookware storing procedure can save the non-stick from scratches. These are-
- If you place one pan on the other, place a soft paper towel on the lower pan cooking surface.
- When you keep the cooking sets on a cookware-rack, protect the pan/pot bottom with some paper towel.
- The best practice will be if hang on this cookware on a cookware hanger. Make sure there must be 6 inches gap presence between two non-stick cookware.
Frequent Usage Of Non Stick Cooking Sprays:
Non-stick cooking sprays contain oil, anti-foaming agents & other chemicals like aerosol. When the pan gets heated up, the oils get vaporized & chemical residues left on the cooking surface.
These residues make the non-stick surface sticky & foods get stuck on it. Over time, frequent uses of cooking spray peeling off the coating from the pans.
The Teflon cookware gets ruined quickly due to cooking spays.
Steel Wool & Hard Scrubber:
All non-stick surfaces are thin layers of coating. Hard scrubber or steels wools are highly abrasives in nature.
These scrubbers not only scratches on the non-stick surfaces but also the metallic surfaces.
Therefore always stay away from the materials, even if the burned foods get stuck on them.
Related: 8 cool ways you can clean non-stick cookware.
Over Cooking Of Citrus Foods:
Most citrus foods are highly corrosives, especially vinegar & lemons. Overcooking of these foods slowly convert the non pours coating into pours one.
As a result, the foods come in contact with the inner base metal & reacts with it. As a result, the metal (aluminum & carbon steel) discharges toxic minerals on foods.
Can We Fixed A Ruined Non-Stick Pan?
Yes, we can fix damaged non-stick cookware. But, it’s a challenging task to find out a permanent solution to ruined non-stick pans.
If you are a budget-oriented person, think twice before purchase, a new cooking set.
Once I was thinking, what if we can pull out damaged non-stick coating & anodized the inner core aluminum. I found one video & few websites that perfectly described how to do anodization of aluminum.
However, the cost of anodization is very high. Probably you can purchase a brand new premium quality non-stick set.
Our recommended solution is to coat the pan with polymerized fat coating. Obliviously, you have to do frequent seasoning & carefully maintain them.
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