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When silicone pans were introduced to the marketplace, food could suddenly be cooked without added butter or oil and slide effortlessly onto the plate.Moreover, cleaning silicone cookware was a snap as there was no food stuck to the pan. Fast forward twenty years when we were told that non-stick silicone coatings may be hazardous to our health.

When looking for an alternative to silicone I remembered the black iron skillet that I had kept hidden in a kitchen cupboard for years. When I bought the iron pan many years ago I had the best intentions of using it because I thought it would be an interesting pan to cook with. But when I brought it home and briefly read the description of how to season and care for it I lost interest. The cast iron skillet was banished to the back of the cupboard.

It was many years later that I took the cast iron pan out of the cupboard and re-examined my decision . I did some research and decided that my iron pan was coming out of the cupboard permanently and would be an important part of my daily cooking. I began by seasoning the skillet.

Seasoning an iron skillet is as simple as oiling it, heating it in the oven at at high heat and then wiping it clean and re-oiling it until further use.

Cleaning an iron skillet is as simple as seasoning one. Heat the skillet, add your ingredients, cook, then clean with soap and water , wipe dry and re-oil. If there is anything crusted to the iron use a stiff steel brush to clean it or add salt to a cloth and rub the tougher food remnants off. Do not let water sit in the iron pan as the pan will rust. Often you only need to wipe the iron skillet without using water and the food remnants will easily wipe away thereby making the pan non-stick naturally without the use of any added silicone or toxic chemicals.
You may be surprised to learn that the more often you use the pan the more non-stick it becomes so in essence the iron pan will morph into a cast iron non-stick pan.

There are also tremendous healthful benefits to cooking in iron. When cooking anything in an iron skillet the iron is transferred from the food into our bloodstreams. I now cook all my greens in the iron pan for a double dose of vitamins and minerals with the added benefit of higher iron. What an easy,natural way to get iron into our diet.

Iron skillets are the oldest forms of pots and pans. Ironware was used for hundreds of years to cook meat and potatoes over wood fires by our earliest settlers. If you are fortunate enough to inherit

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