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How to properly anneal a cast-iron cauldron at home, video
Before you start cooking your favorite dishes, you need to figure out how to anneal a cast-iron cauldron at home. This procedure is indispensable in order to get rid of the remnants of industrial grease and prepare it for cooking.
You can ignite a cast-iron cauldron with salt
How to anneal a cast-iron cauldron correctly? The whole system includes two stages.
- Primary calcination at high temperatures.
- Secondary calcination with oil at moderate temperatures.
Heat treatment is carried out on a stove, in an oven or over a fire. The last option is the best, since it allows you to burn dishes from all sides at the same time, and at the same time all the unpleasant smell from the evaporation of soot does not remain in the room. Otherwise, you will have to open the windows for ventilation and turn on the hood at maximum power.
The cauldron is preliminarily rinsed with warm water and put on the fire, the temperature of the fire is gradually increased to 300 degrees. The calcination procedure can take several hours, and the end of fuming will indicate its completion. This means that all the industrial grease that the cauldron was treated with at the factory evaporated and the walls were cleaned.
There is another way, it shortens the procedure time and gives less fumes: you need ordinary salt.
How to anneal a cast-iron cauldron with salt:
- pour 1-2 bags of table salt into the cauldron;
- put the dishes on high heat for 2-3 hours;
- when the salt darkens and dark smoke stops coming from the cast iron, the procedure is considered complete.
This method is suitable for those who ignite the cauldron in the apartment on the stove. It does not give off a lot of unpleasant odor and smoke less. After the completion of the calcination and cooling of the container, wipe it from the inside with a soft cloth.
How to anneal a cast-iron cauldron with oil
Cast iron cookware, despite its massiveness and considerable weight, is very fragile and often cracks if used improperly. Illiterate secondary processing also has a bad effect on its quality. It consists in re-calcining the cauldron with any vegetable oil.
The procedure is as follows:
- about 50 ml of oil is poured into the still hot cauldron and, with the help of a brush, smear it inside with a generous layer;
- turn on a medium-intensity fire. If this is an oven, then set the temperature to no more than 180 degrees;
- calcined the cauldron for 2-3 hours, gradually adding a new layer of oil, there can be 3-5 such cycles.
The dishes are now ready to cook food that will never burn in them. You can watch the video on how to anneal a cast-iron cauldron below.