New Tea Pot

W. Hilditch

Active member
Bought an new CI teapot off Amazon styled as a 1900 pot. It was labeled for humidifier only. Lye didn’t cut the paint, but a gallon of paint stripper did. Got 99% of the toxic paint off then a mineral spirit bath and a lye bath again. Seasoned it with lard.

Proceeded to boil out 4 full pots of water to get some calcium build-up. Got some semi-loose calcium, some rust and 47 other minerals. Not great taste between the cast iron and the minerals. Popcorn time.

Boiled out another full pot of water for a good coating of calcium then made two batches of popcorn with canola. Baked at 450° F for 2 hours. Now it gives some hot potable water good enough for tea, coffee or cooking as the calcium builds over time. A bit of a hassle but this water pot will outlive me without killing me.



Hilditch
 
Nice pot....Good to see you have one that will hold water now. I've been working on two cast aluminum (one Wagner and one Griswold) each six quarts.
Both have years of calcium buildup inside them....Any idea how to get those years of buildup removed? Both have wooden handles so SCO is not an option.
 
Review: This dry 10 lb. water pot is not user friendly. It takes two hot padded hands to pour, a dinner knife to open and close the lid, drips and dribbles where you don’t want it to while pouring. Then it should be emptied and dried after each use. It also sill maintains some iron flavor to remind one of the good old days.

Hilditch
 
Probably part of it although the poison paint should have come first. Or they might have just said that to keep people from taking it backpacking.

Hilditch
 
Update: The challenge of getting this pot right has continued. After multiple coats of food grade calcium enhanced water following previous coatings the pot was kept full of steaming water for a few days to create black rust. Sixteen hours on, 8 hours off. The combination of the black rust and the calcium created an amazing hard surface coating on the iron.



Now 1 1/2 qts. of water was added, brought to a boil and taste tested.



There is a slight discoloration and my SO detected a very slight metallic flavor. I didn’t, but we agreed a tea bag or coffee would overcome said metallic flavor. I believe this water pot has arrived to where it would have been 100+ years ago sitting on a cast iron stove.

Hilditch
 
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