Hi, it is my understanding that seed oils/vegetable oil are bad for cardiovascular health, to some extent. I’m not a huge cook to be honest but I got a cast iron pan recently so I’m going to cook more. I’ve mostly always used just olive oil or butter, however the consensus is that olive oil isn’t the best for seasoning because it can go rancid. I assume butter is the same. I’ve also been told flaxseed oil is bad because it flakes.
I guess my question is, should I use some kind of none seed oil and see what works? I was thinking of starting with avocado oil or something. But also, forex the oil used for seasoning matter as much health wise as it would for just cooking? Thanks
Hi, not a nutrition expert, but I have been a cast iron user for over a decade and use it daily. A lot of comments here clearly do not understand what you’re asking and are giving either bad or misinformed answers.
So here’s the deal, you’ve got a basic understanding of how cast iron is used and maintained, but have it a bit jumbled up. That’s to be expected when it’s a whole new world to dive into though. Where you seem to have gotten hung up is the term seasoning. It’s a loaded word in the cast iron world but it’s not really that complicated. I’m going to break down how cast iron works below, and hopefully that answers the questions you have.
The science behind using cast iron is pretty simple. It’s conducts heat well, it’s durable, and can retain heat for a long time. Bare metal however will rust near instantly when exposed to oxygen. Here’s where “seasoning” comes in. In it’s purest form, all “seasoning” is is a collection of very thin layers of carbonized and polymerized fat. These layers of fat stick to the open pores of the iron and at it’s base level, allows you to cook with the iron without it rusting. Over time, the more your pan builds up these thin layers of fat, the more your pan will act like a non-stick surface and will be easier to clean.
That being said, “seasoning” when referring to cast iron is two separate things, a verb and an adjective. When seasoning is being used as a verb, it is describing a process you generally only go through with your pan if you’re starting from bare iron. In this process, you are building the initial layers of fat that will keep your pan from rusting and will allow you a food-safe surface to cook with. For these first few layers, you want a neutral-flavored oil/fat with a high smoke point, because to set those first few carbonized layers, you need to really open up the pores of the iron to accept the fat/oil and bake the fat into the pan. This is the stage that people recommend not using butter/olive oil, because they have very low smoke points and have a relatively short shelf life, so if you were to build your initial seasoning layers off of these alone there is a chance that your base layers will develop a rancid quality. Flaxseed oil is a hotly debated issue in the cast iron restoration world, but really it’s more a personal preference than anything. It produces a very glossy finish but yes, does flake very easily if not careful.
When seasoning is referred to as an adjective however, it is not referring to the above stages of care and maintenance one goes through to make the pan usable, but instead it’s generally just referring to the total layers of fat baked into the pan over time. These layers of “seasoning” are what accumulates as you cook with the pan. Also, as part of cleaning the pan, you want to make sure the pan ends up completely dry once clean, and then you just wipe a very thin layer of fat in and around the pan, essentially to ensure that if you wore down any of those base layers of seasoning when the pan was in use that the pan is protected from oxidation. When you are cooking, baking or finishing cleaning of your pan, you can use whatever your preference is for fat. If you want to use butter or olive oil, there’s no issue whatsoever.
So the answer to your question is…cook with whatever oil or fat you normally do! Smoke point and rancidity are only really a concern when setting your initial cooking surface. After that, you can mix and match however you want to. On any given day I’ll use any mixture of olive oil, canola, butter, crisco, flaxseed oil and bacon grease in my pan, and none of them make any difference over the others when it comes to how the pan reacts to them. I could cook with only olive oil in my cast iron every day and it would be unaffected, because only a microscopic amount is sticking to the already built up layers of seasoning.
I hope that little primer helps. It can be daunting trying to figure out maintenance and care of what is supposed to be a very simple tool.
All oil can go rancid. You should be using a light enough coating of oil and using your pan frequently enough that the seasoning oil doesn’t have an opportunity to do so.
That being said, I’m a big fan of avocado oil as a cast iron seasoning. Clarified butter works well, too
You’re not coating your pan with liquid oil and storing it like that, you’re using high heat to perform a chemical reaction to turn oil into a hard polymer material that makes the rough metal slick and non-stick.
It doesn’t really matter what you use.
Canola oil.
Whether seed or vegetable oils are good or bad for cardiovascular health is essentially irrelevant here. You’re using it to season the cast iron, not for cooking with. Its presence in your food is negligible if you’re not actually cooking with it.
Olive oil doesnot go rancid.. lolObvious you need to use a good source of it, either you can cook with olive oil virgen extra or 0.4 (not sure you will find this type in the states). Using olive oil for cooking around 2 to 4 times. It would be safe enough. Olive oil hold high temperatures and doesnot alter in any nasty way as any other kind of oils or butter.Butter otherwise is a good way to cloth veins in the long term.
(- If you have olive oil that goes rancid..that means your source is not olive oil 100%, label can say whatever tho.
Best fats for seasoning or cooking in a cast iron skillet are the natural saturated fats, like lard, tallow, coconut oils. Please avoid seed oils like the plague. Of course, you can cook with avocado oil, though I usually recommend not cooking with olive oil because it has a lower smoke point. But to take care of your pan, you can always just cook some strips or bacon, then use the left over fat to cook something else
TL;DR: plant oils and lineseed oil are the best.
many people here give misinformed answers.some mention very good, oxidation resistant oils for frying - say avocado oil, ghee, etc.but the thing is - you WANT oxidation to happen.if you use an inert oil like the above not much will happen and the seasoning will be wiped away by cleaning it the next time - because it’s just oil.you want to get a seasoning, which is the black crust made out of polymerized triglycerides (fat).to get that you need polyunsaturated fatty acids, which are very prone to oxidation.thats the reason why you don’t want to eat them btw.
i personally have very good experiences with an alteration between rapeseed/ sunflower oil and lineseed oil.one layer lineseed, one canola, one lineseed, you get it. lineseed ist extremely good, but cracks easily, and rapeseed is okayish, but stable.heat your oven with 160-200C and put the covered pan in for about an hour or til it stops smoking.repeat that for 5 times and finish it with some good frying oil: grease, coconut oil, ghee, avocado oil, you name it.you now have a great seasoning which is extremely resistant an basically non stick.i treat my pan like shit and it works perfectly. the seasoning is, contrary to many peoples belief, resistant for dish soap and protects the pan
Olive oil is bad for seasoning because of the low smoke point.
Use ground nut or canola oil. Both are good for this job and as they are polymerised into the surface, it doesn’t matter if they’re good for you.
Anyone who says olive oil doesn’t know anything about cooking with Cast Iron. You want a healthy oil with a high smoke point and can ruin the seasoning of the pan. So use either Flax or Avocado. I prefer avocado because of how neutral it is.
I’m a chef with 40 years experience and I’m mostly cook on cast iron. You can’t use butter because of the milk solids in it. Vegetable oils gets sticky and are not good for your pans. Make a batch of ghee and use that and your pans will perform beautifully.
I use bear lard to season all my cast. There’s nothing better. I render the l are myself in the cast and it does a beautiful job of seasoning it. As for cooking I use lard or bacon grease. It’s all natural and unprocessed.
What cast iron and oil what are you making a show piece lol, cast iron doesn’t FOLD TO OIL YOU GET THAT BACON BACON GREASE AND WATCH FOOD PORN BE CREATED, YOU OIL IT MIGHT AS WELL USE YOUR TEARS AFTER YOUR WIFE BEATS YOUR ASS WITH HER ONLY ONE BACON COOKING CAST LOL THEN YOUR IN FINE LAND AND SHE SAY THATS FINE I DONT CARE ABOUT OIL REALLY TAKE THOSE FINAL WORDS AND GET TO RUNNIN