Caustic soda OK for burnt pan?

If the OP isn't too clued on on "O" Level chemistry, suggesting the use of < ether > in a kitchen could lead to very interesting and dangerous(?) results.

|Trying to resurrect a pan (s/steel I think?) which is comprehensively |caked in burnt-on residue (long story, don't ask). Think the pan is OK |below the crud but a two-day soak and pan scrub is doing nothing. |Should caustic soda be OK to use, or might the pan dissolve too? (Can't |remember my 0-level chemistry!) | |If it's not stainless steel might it be something else that might be |adversely affected?

We soak burnt pans in hot water with washing powder, bio or non bio makes no difference. Perhaps a quick scrape to finish the job.

Fill pan with water and put in an improbably large amount of dishwasher powder (like 1/2 a mug full or more)

Bring to the boil.

If after 15 minutes the water has turned a disgusting shade of brown you are making progress. Discard contents and repeat above until the pan is gleaming.

David H.

Actually I am indeed an aficionado of that very pan-scrub, and if I could find one I'd be using it now! We used to use one called (perversely) "Goldilocks" but haven't seen them for ages. Current model is totally useless - pseudometal plastic of some sort.

David

When I used to burn food in metal pans (haven't done it for years) there was an easy solution. I did it with aluminium, stainless steel, copper and iron.

Put the pan, empty, on the hottest burner you have. The carbon (that's what the burnt food has turned to) will burn to carbon dioxide and leave the metal cleaner than it's been since new.

It won't be shiny but that's not important. You can bring up a shine mechanically if you like but what's the point?

WARNING: don't do it with a pan with any kind of coating - 'non-stick', teflon, anodised, enamel - ANYTHING.

Mary

I used to know the answer...

Mine wasn't. I have an old aluminium pan and an aluminium pressure cooker both inherited from the four bears. Can't say either of them get much use but they don't appear to have done me any harm. I know that because I can still ummm, sorry what was the question again?

I saw those women on TV use coke (the drink) to clean a pan. Poured a litre or so in and heated gently. To get it working well I think you'll need to fully rinse any alkali off first though.

Be sure to report back - I'd be interested to hear if it works as well as it looked.

Jon

It's easy to melt aluminium on a gas ring. Not SS, though - it will just go blue.

IIRC, they were the first type to have a non stick coating. And still readily available today - aluminium gives a much more even spread of heat over the entire pan.

Neither has happened to me and I've got them glowing.

Mary

Aluminium melts before it glows. Most likely, you have an alloy.

I tried it last week, worked fine. This was just discolouration in the bottom of a stainless steel pan, rather than burnt on food though. Mythbusters explored the various uses of coke too, and found it was better at cleaning chrome than chrome cleaner was. Cheapest nastiest asda own brand was what I used.

I got some burnt rice off a SS pan the other day, by boiling some diluted household amonia for a five minutes in it. The amonia gas was driven off completely in that time, but I was able to remove the burnt rice with a plastic brush after that.

-- JJ

The message from "Jason" contains these words:

How did it taste?

In message , Cicero writes

Rather the opposite really

I don't think there was ever a strong suggestion scientifically, but it seemed to catch media/public attention. In 1997 the WHO declared that al wasn't health risk for those not exposed to it at work, and no evidence that it was primary cause of Alzheimer's. And anyway, the amount of Al that gets into food through cooking in contact with Al is very low. Though it's best not to use it with highly acidic foods as it can taint the food.

I've got an Al pressure cooker and couple of uncoated Al pans I picked up along the way somewhere. My Mum still has and uses her set of Swan pans she has had for ever AFAIK. New EU regs came in in I think 2004 tht I think effectively bans uncoated Aluminum.

I much prefer much good quaity anodised and non-stick Al pans to Stainless steel ones.

|In article , | "Mary Fisher" writes: |> |> Neither has happened to me and I've got them glowing. | |Aluminium melts before it glows. |Most likely, you have an alloy.

Almost nobody uses pure aluminium for anything, it is much too soft and ductile. I had no end of trouble getting some 99% aluminium sheet for a project. Pans will be some recycled alloy, I believe that alloy from ships is very good.

When post mortems were done on people who had died with Alzheimer's they were sometimes found to have small collections of aluminium salts in their brain.

That was the only link.

The media made the most of it - as they do - and the public mostly believe what they see on tv so it became a fact.

Some other corpses also had the aluminium in their brain, by the way ...

Mary

======================= Recent news items have suggested that Alzheimer's disease can be prevented by drinking orange juice several times a week. I wonder if the orange juice clears the aluminium from the brain.

Cic.

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