Preheating

StephenH

Member
With my paper towel thread and now the frying potatoes thread, I have a question. And, who knows, maybe it will have an important answer?

I add oil/grease right after I turn on the heat and the oil heats up with the skillet; I feel the skillet is really to use when its (the handle) too hot to the touch with my bare hand. But, in the potato thread, and other threads, people preheat their CI, and test with a little water, before they add oil/grease.

May or may not matter, but, what do you do and do you feel that one way is better than the other?

thanks,
Stephen
 
I pre-heat my pan before adding my cooking oil. I do not however, heat it all the way up to my intended cooking temp immediately.

The reason is this, you can't tell how hot your pan is if there is nothing in the pan.

I heat the pan until I can fell heat coming off the surface with my hand about an inch above the surface. Any hotter and you can actually accidentally burn your cooking oil, which can adversely affect the flavor of what you are cooking.

When I add my oil it usually takes about 30 seconds to a minute for it to heat up enough for the oil to "ripple", which is when I know it's at frying temp. If I need it cooler, I turn the heat down a bit.
 
I do not preheat and then add oil. I preheat with oil in the skillet, deep fryer, corn bread pan, etc. Doesn't make sense to me to preheat and then add cold oil which then has to be heated again. Hasn't caused me any problems. FWIW, I do not preheat at all when frying bacon. Give the skillet a shot of Pam or spread around a tablespoon of canola oil, put in the bacon, then start heating.
 
With my paper towel thread and now the frying potatoes thread, I have a question. And, who knows, maybe it will have an important answer?

I add oil/grease right after I turn on the heat and the oil heats up with the skillet; I feel the skillet is really to use when its (the handle) too hot to the touch with my bare hand. But, in the potato thread, and other threads, people preheat their CI, and test with a little water, before they add oil/grease.

May or may not matter, but, what do you do and do you feel that one way is better than the other?

thanks,
Stephen

Stephen, I think it would help if you could clarify exactly how, or what, you are cooking. Are you just lightly oiling the bottom of a skillet, say to sear/brown something, OR, are you filling a skillet, say half full of oil, as if to deep fry something, such as french fries ? I believe you are receiving answers for both cooking methods, which is only going to confuse things even more.
 
Not deep frying, lightly oiling for searing/browning.

In that case, I begin by warming the skillet partially, then I drizzle some olive oil over the cooking surface, then slowly bring it on up to temp, as mentioned earlier by RLMuse, to where the oil starts to "ripple".
 
For me, it reall depends on what I'm cooking and where I'm cooking it in:

For deepfrying something in raw cast iron I preheat and heat the oil together with the cold skillet; the same for bacon. And since I never heat my enameled cast iron over low medium heat, I preheat and heat it with oil already in it, too, and then add the food to sautée in once the oil is warm/hot enough. Thea reason for the latter is that I want to follow Lodge's instructions to never heat their enameled cast iron cookware empty.

On the other hand, for stuff that I fry much drier (with less oil) in raw cast iron, like potatoes, onions, ground beef, etc. I preheat the skillet empty and also bring it up to cooking temperature empty (then do the water drop test). Mind you, you need to closely watch your skillet in the last heating phase to not let it get too hot.

Last but not least, if I sear steaks I do not add any oil to the skillet, but instead lightly oil the steaks. I may add a little butter and some garlic later on, though, once the actual frying is done and the steaks are almost ready to rest and then serve.
 
I stir-fry various vegetables a lot. I put my oil in as soon as I turn on the heat and put a small piece of onion or whatever in the pan. When the piece begins to slightly sizzle, I start adding my vegetables.
 
I turn on the heat and add the oil immediately. The oil heats up with the pan. I feel like the adding the oil/butter to a hot pan would heat to oil/butter too quickly and be more prone to burning. That being said, it's sounds like a number of you are adding oil to a hot pan with fine results, so sounds like both ways work.
 
When I'm stir frying, I heat the pan then add the oil and then immediately add the food. This way I can get the pan screaming hot without burning the oil. The oil is protected from the hot pan for a bit by a thin layer of vaporized oil, this is called the Leidenfrost effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leidenfrost_effect

I like to get the pan very hot because the food is a large heat sink causing the pan temp to drop a lot initially.
 
I stir-fry various vegetables a lot. I put my oil in as soon as I turn on the heat and put a small piece of onion or whatever in the pan. When the piece begins to slightly sizzle, I start adding my vegetables.

Great tip, Donna! Thanks!
 
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