AmazingRibs.com is supported by our Pitmaster Club. Also, when you buy with links on our site we may earn a finder’s fee. Click to see how we test and review products.

Lodge 12 Inch Cast Iron Skillet Is An Everyday Essential

Share on:
cast iron skillet

A Kitchen Workhorse For Both Cooking And Prep

The Lodge 12 inch cast-iron skillet is an essential cooking tool, bot heavy and heavy duty. Thankfully, it’s also cheap. I don’t use it for omelets or onions, but I do use it for cooking steaks, chops, burgers, and fish, and for frying potatoes. I use it on the stovetop, in the oven, on the grill, on the side burner, and camping. Use it to pound chicken breasts, press sandwiches, smash potatoes, and crush spices or nuts, too.

Cast iron gets very hot and transmits heat to food rapidly. It is the best way to get a crust on a burger. Click here to read more about the science of cast iron. After the surface is seasoned, it is practically nonstick. There are the only two downsides to cast iron. It is heavy, and it needs a little effort to care for. The metal must be heated and treated with cooking oil to keep it from rusting and create the nonstick properties. If you scrub it too hard, you can ruin the seasoning.

But really, the maintenance isn’t that hard. Click here for our complete guide to seasoning, cleaning, and repairing cast iron. The cheat sheet: just use a soft scrubbie and little or no soap. To restore the seasoning, rub it with oil, and bake the pan empty and upside down in a 500 degree oven or grill for an hour. Then turn off the oven or grill and let it cool down, removing the pan when it’s cool enough to handle.

I have two 12 inch cast iron frying pans: one for fish and one for everything else. The fish pan seems to always have a fishy smell when heated.

If you can find cast iron pans in garage sales or flea markets, get them because they are probably well seasoned. But recently manufacturers have begun shipping pre-seasoned pans. Get one with a lip to make pouring off grease easy, and an ear opposite the handle because these suckers are heavy. The Lodge Logic 12-Inch Pre-Seasoned Skillet is the gold standard.

Click here to check prices and order on Amazon

Haven't found what you want?
Click the buttons below to search our complete database of reviews:

Product Information:

Related reviews

Published On: 9/22/2018 Last Modified: 4/27/2021

  • Meathead, AmazingRibs.com Founder And BBQ Hall of Famer - Founder and publisher of AmazingRibs.com, Meathead is known as the site's Hedonism Evangelist and BBQ Whisperer. He is also the author of the New York Times Best Seller "Meathead, The Science of Great Barbecue and Grilling", and is a BBQ Hall Of Fame inductee.

 

High quality websites are expensive to run. If you help us, we’ll pay you back bigtime with an ad-free experience and a lot of freebies!

Millions come to AmazingRibs.com every month for high quality tested recipes, tips on technique, science, mythbusting, product reviews, and inspiration. But it is expensive to run a website with more than 2,000 pages and we don’t have a big corporate partner to subsidize us.

Our most important source of sustenance is people who join our Pitmaster Club. But please don’t think of it as a donation. Members get MANY great benefits. We block all third-party ads, we give members free ebooks, magazines, interviews, webinars, more recipes, a monthly sweepstakes with prizes worth up to $2,000, discounts on products, and best of all a community of like-minded cooks free of flame wars. Click below to see all the benefits, take a free 30 day trial, and help keep this site alive.


Post comments and questions below

grouchy?

1) Please try the search box at the top of every page before you ask for help.

2) Try to post your question to the appropriate page.

3) Tell us everything we need to know to help such as the type of cooker and thermometer. Dial thermometers are often off by as much as 50°F so if you are not using a good digital thermometer we probably can’t help you with time and temp questions. Please read this article about thermometers.

4) If you are a member of the Pitmaster Club, your comments login is probably different.

5) Posts with links in them may not appear immediately.

Moderators

  Max

Click to comment or ask a question...

Spotlight

These are not paid ads, they are a curated selection of products we love.

All of the products below have been tested and are highly recommended. Click here to read more about our review process.

Use Our Links To Help Keep Us Alive

Many merchants pay us a small referral fee when you click our “buy now” links. This has zero impact on the price you pay but helps support the site.