Add in the older one- and three-notch Lodges and the BSR's (Red Mountain and Century series)

I've go a bunch.. We had a cabin in tennessee and there was a Lodge factory store that sold blemished cast iron for dirt cheap. I bet I have about 15 pans in total.

A coworker of my wife was thrilled the other day that he found a Griswald #13. He paid $1100 for it. The guy he bought it from paid $6 at a garage sale.

Bighamp03 said:

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OilAggie said:

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Do I have to use flaxseed oil? Can I use peanut oil?

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Yes, you can use peanut oil. Canola, vegetable, coconut, whatever. Just bake it at 450-500f.

I got flaxseed oil after reading that article, but a lot of people have issues with it flaking and say Crisco is better. As long as you put a decent base seasoning on and just cook with it it will be fine.

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I was working on seasoning one of my pans the other day and when I took it out of the oven, it had a tacky residue. What did I do wrong?

Too much oil. You should wipe off as much as possible, only a very thin layer will be left

schmellba99 said:

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CanyonAg77 said:

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A coworker of my wife was thrilled the other day that he found a Griswald #13. He paid $1100 for it. The guy he bought it from paid $6 at a garage sale.

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Your wife's co-worker is a moron. I'll sell him all of my stuff for $500 each.

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Well, he does work at the local WMD plant



And it apparently completed his collection, so he's happy

Vernada said:

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Bighamp03 said:

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OilAggie said:

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Do I have to use flaxseed oil? Can I use peanut oil?

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Yes, you can use peanut oil. Canola, vegetable, coconut, whatever. Just bake it at 450-500f.

I got flaxseed oil after reading that article, but a lot of people have issues with it flaking and say Crisco is better. As long as you put a decent base seasoning on and just cook with it it will be fine.

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I was working on seasoning one of my pans the other day and when I took it out of the oven, it had a tacky residue. What did I do wrong?

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What BC007 said.

Heat your oven up to 200, put your pan or skillet or whatever in there for about 30 mins to get good and warm. Put about a TSP of oil in the pan, then take a paper towel and wipe until you get the entire surface coated. Then take another 2 or 3 paper towels and wipe until you have almost all of the oil removed - there should be only a super thin layer on that you can barely feel. Put in the oven at 450-500 for an hour (I usually do 2, but I also usually get busy and forget I have the thing in there). Turn the oven off and let it cool overnight. You'll probably have to repeat the steps 3-4 times, it's not an instant process.

I have all my grandmother's cast iron. No clue how old it is, but it is my cooking vessels of choice.

If you come across old and crust cast iron that you want to restore, simply go to your friendly neighborhood body shop and ask them to sandblast it for you. They'll come out sparkling clean and bare, and you can start from scratch on the seasoning process. Most places will only charge you a few bucks.

BCO07 said:

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Too much oil. You should wipe off as much as possible, only a very thin layer will be left

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I thought I had wiped it down good. Guess not. I'll give it another go. Thanks!

Any thoughts on EDM forming a cast iron pan?

My friend is picking up a couple EDM machines to play with

Cross posted to food & spirits, but can anybody help Id this skillet?

I'm debating as to whether that ridge goes all the way to the side wall or not otherwise I'd totally agree. There's a 5mm or so flat spot that makes me think wagner, but it shouldn't have a ring if it is.

But, all the pictures match. So, I'm with you. Thanks

I'm pretty sure it is a BSR. I've got a 3 X that looks very similar. The flat on Wagners is fairly obvious, and not just a tiny flat spot.

Also, the pour spouts on Wagner's tend to be pretty big, whereas BSR's are fairly small, which is another giveaway..

So that's from the 30s? Got that and a 10 inch 3 notch lodge for free this morning. Both need some work, but should clean up well

hot_rod_9384 said:

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OilAggie said:

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Do I have to use flaxseed oil? Can I use peanut oil?

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I use crisco. Put the pan in upside down with a pan under to catch the drips

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When I did that, I ended up with little "bumps" where the oil dripped from the upside down skillet. How do you avoid that?

BCO07 said:

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Use less oil/crisco

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Yeah you should wipe off all of the oil that you can. I mean all of it.

I apply crisco, wipe off as much as possible, then put back in the oven for 20 +/- minutes at 300, remove, wipe off again, then back in at 500.

As long as you are wiping it off to the point where it seems like there is nothing left, you shouldn't have issues. Maybe try something other than crisco

HumbleAg said:

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hot_rod_9384 said:

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OilAggie said:

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Do I have to use flaxseed oil? Can I use peanut oil?

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I use crisco. Put the pan in upside down with a pan under to catch the drips

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When I did that, I ended up with little "bumps" where the oil dripped from the upside down skillet. How do you avoid that?

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heat up the skillet until the crisco melts, wipe away the excess, then put in the oven upside down

Log said:

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Birmingham Stove & Range, size 5, mold L, Red Mountain series.

The sharp ridge on the bottom of the handle that goes all the way up to the body of the pan is a BSR giveaway.

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Learned something,new. I have one of these, 8D. Hell of a good pan. Only one I dont know anything about is a completely unmarked 5" pan. Only marking a 5 on the top side of the handle. Same handle shape as the BSR, but not the same underside v shape.

Large pour spouts & flat bottom (no heat ring)? Might be a Wagner. They tended to put the number on the top of the handle near the body of the pan.

The lodge pre-seasoning is junk but I like the original finish pan I have. So, I'm going to get a Lodge pan that is preseasoned -- only thing you can get now -- and just strip the inside of the pan.

Will steel wool do the job or do I need a power tool?

As far as seasoning goes, I don't think you can beat lard or bacon fat. We normally fry bacon on the George Foreman grill but I'd do it in a new pan. The pan I have has been used mostly for cornbread and seasoned nicely over the years.

Spray down your skillet with the yellow can Easy-Off, and stick it in a trash bag for a day or so. Once done, pull it out, and scrub it down under cold running water with a steel brush (found on the paint stripping aisle at HD). This will remove all of the factory seasoning.

***THE FOLLOWING IS ONLY FOR USE ON MODERN STUFF aka LODGE; NOT FOR USE ON VINTAGE PIECES!!!***

Once you have done this, get one of the Diablo power drill sanding pad attachments from HD and get some 36/40, 80, and 120 grit sanding discs. Start low grit, and work your way to high. Use the coarse pads until it starts looking smooth, then transition to the finer grits to finish it out.

***END RANT***

Some of the older Wagner's are a slick as glass after seasoning. Seriously. It's kind of uncanny how smooth they made them back then. I've got some more recent vintage ones that are a lot smoother than modern Lodge, but still coarse compared to my vintage Wanger Ware's. I picked up a random Taiwan skillet in a skillet bundle that was extremely coarse, but has a really nice geometry, so I am currently working on the cooking surface, using the above method, to get it smoothed out. Seems to be working well so far. Figured I'd use it as a guinea pig, since it's non-collectible.

You can use lard/tallow (if you want to pay the extra for it), but I wouldn't use bacon grease. Bacon grease has salt in it from the curing process, which can't help the metal in the long run. You need a pure oil of some sort that polymerizes under high heat to create the seasoning, with no impurities. Which is why most people use Crisco. It's a pure vegetable oil, and any trans- fats (if you are worried about that), get converted during the polymerization process. Once your skillet is fully seasoned, cooking bacon or salty and/or acidic foods isn't an issue, as long as you clean the skillet afterwards and give it a good oil wipedown, since the polymerized seasoning is pretty impervious to most things thrown at it, being that it is basically a natural plastic.

I'm interested to compare a new lodge that is not sanded down, but well seasoned to old super smooth stuff. This new lodge is awfully non stick so I'd be really surprised if the old stuff was noticeably better

Log said:

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Large pour spouts & flat bottom (no heat ring)? Might be a Wagner. They tended to put the number on the top of the handle near the body of the pan.

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Yep. That's what I was guessing, but it's hard to tell with no markings. Don't really care too much, it's a good pan that I use near daily and brand doesn't mean a whole lot.

91AggieLawyer said:

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The lodge pre-seasoning is junk but I like the original finish pan I have. So, I'm going to get a Lodge pan that is preseasoned -- only thing you can get now -- and just strip the inside of the pan.

Will steel wool do the job or do I need a power tool?

As far as seasoning goes, I don't think you can beat lard or bacon fat. We normally fry bacon on the George Foreman grill but I'd do it in a new pan. The pan I have has been used mostly for cornbread and seasoned nicely over the years.

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I went the power tool route. Quick and easy. Dirty, but quick and easy. Used a stiff wire wheel on my 4-1/2" angle grinder. Had it down to bare metal in just a few minutes. A quick sand with some 120, 180 and 220 in my orbital sander to smooth the cooking surface out and in the oven with flax seed oil to get the seasoning surface established. Relatively easy and didn't take all that long.

I got a new pan and did the easy off thing. The factory stuff appeared to just wash right off. Is sanding necessary?

91AggieLawyer said:

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I got a new pan and did the easy off thing. The factory stuff appeared to just wash right off. Is sanding necessary?

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sanding smooths the surface. If the surface is smooth you can skip the sanding step

I meant is sanding necessary for a) the seasoning to stick well and b) for non-stick purposes once seasoned. The pan isn't pure smooth but it isn't exactly rough.

Oh, as far as easy off goes, get a homer bucket, put a trash bag over it inside out, put the pan on the top, spray away -- both sides, pull the bag up and set aside. Much easier than trying to get a sprayed pan into a closed bag.