Friday, November 24, 2017

Omelets, Cast Iron, and the Induction Burner

With the Nativity fast coming up, it's time to clean out the fridge. I had a dozen eggs laughing at me, so I decided to try omelets in the cast iron skillet on my induction burner.

I decided first to try the traditional method of cooking in a hot pan (well, 284F). That worked fine, but then I remembered reading that eggs cook at 160F. My induction burner has 140F and 176F, so I tried 176F (low and slow, like for tough meat).

Note: When I make omelets, I add lots of salty ingredients to the filling, so I don't add them to the eggs.

The low and slow method produced eggs that were just as good as the hot pan, plus I got the chance to try flipping the omelet (which worked great, thanks to the nonstick qualities of well-seasoned cast iron). The eggs flipped out the pan without sticking (I couldn't blow them out because I had three eggs in the pan). Additionally, I got the eggs done without being too browned on the bottom (just a tiny bit for the Maillard effect).

If you don't want to try flipping, put a lid on the cast-iron pan.

Next I'm going to heat the pan and see how evenly it heats on induction with my laser thermometer. I don't know what the results will be, but that's the fun of science!

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