Need new roasting pan

[Twimum]

Hi everyone, I'm looking at getting a new roasting pan. The one I've used for years has served me extremely well - it's a Bessemer pan but I haven't seen it mentioned here, so maybe it's just sold in Australia. I'm wondering what everyone else would recommend? With the Bessemer I'd throw the chicken and vegetables in and the potatoes would come out beautiful and caramelised (sucs?) on the bottom. Thinking about a Le Crueset now - can someone tell me if does roasts in the oven well?

 

[Leolady]

I have several Le Creuset and Copco roasting pans in various sizes and I love them all.

If you buy one, you will like it I am sure.

 

[justplainbill]

After close to 100 years, our Lisk roaster is alive and well.

 

[Twimum]

Thanks plainbill... I did some Googling and looks like they don't sell Lisk in Australia. So far it's the Le Crueset (thanks Leolady!).

 

[milly]

Le Creuset frying pans did not perform well in Consumer Reports tests. Their top performer is Swiss Diamond - we've got one recently, it gets really hot and holds temperature well.

 

[Leolady]

Le Creuset frying pans did not perform well in Consumer Reports tests. Their top performer is Swiss Diamond - we've got one recently, it gets really hot and holds temperature well.

We are talking about a open roasting pan, not a frying pan. Comparing the two is like comparing apples and oranges.

 

[FrankZ]

After close to 100 years, our Lisk roaster is alive and well.

How many times a week did you use it over the last 100 years?

No really, it is awesome that you have something that has lasted that long and is still usable.

 

[justplainbill]

How many times a week did you use it over the last 100 years?

No really, it is awesome that you have something that has lasted that long and is still usable.

Wish I also had my great grandmother's wood / coal cookstove that the Lisk pan was originally used in.

 

[Caslon]

Roasts are so expensive now, a lot of ppl are buying smaller roasts. I like the design of roasting pans with the v shaped rack, but was hoping to see a smaller version. I now use just a Corning ware shallow cassarole dish for small roasts. I sometimes set a small cooling rack down in the dish and set the roast on that. I wonder if it's better to use the cooling rack or just set the small roast down directly on the casserole dish.

 

[Robo410]

I always use veg as my rack. they taste much better. if I don't want to serve them they can help make a pan sauce.

 

[Andy M.]

... I wonder if it's better to use the cooling rack or just set the small roast down directly on the casserole dish.

I do a lot of small roasts in my CI skillet with no rack. Works fine.

 

[Caslon]

I always use veg as my rack. they taste much better. if I don't want to serve them they can help make a pan sauce.

Ya...the drippings from a roast. How to make use of, I'd appreciate it.

 

[Vanitas]

Ya...the drippings from a roast. How to make use of, I'd appreciate it.

There's lots of options. What works best for me is adding a corn starch slurry to the drippings to make a nice gravy. I usually make my roasts in the crock pot, so I make the gravy in it once the meat/veggies are taken out.

One of my biggest cooking accomplishments is when I made my first gravy from drippings. My mom always made her roast gravy with flour - and let's just say mom's gravy is a family joke. It's really bad (sorry mom!), and I was telling a friend at work about it. She suggested the corn starch slurry. My next roast, I tried it and made a beautiful gravy. I even called my mom to tell her I had just made gravy that blew hers out of the water. Now when we visit my parents and they make roast, I'm in charge of making gravy

 

[Chief Longwind Of The North]

There's lots of options. What works best for me is adding a corn starch slurry to the drippings to make a nice gravy. I usually make my roasts in the crock pot, so I make the gravy in it once the meat/veggies are taken out.

One of my biggest cooking accomplishments is when I made my first gravy from drippings. My mom always made her roast gravy with flour - and let's just say mom's gravy is a family joke. It's really bad (sorry mom!), and I was telling a friend at work about it. She suggested the corn starch slurry. My next roast, I tried it and made a beautiful gravy. I even called my mom to tell her I had just made gravy that blew hers out of the water. Now when we visit my parents and they make roast, I'm in charge of making gravy

If you make a roux out of flour and the fat from the pan drippings, or butter, flour based gravies are a truly wonderful thing. There are no lumps, and no raw flour flavor. It's just another option.

Making Yorkshire pudding, or popovers from the pan drippings is another great way to use pan drippings.

Extraordinary pan drippings are achieved by adding lardoons to the roast, especially if they are made of bacon. Also, place mushrooms and chopped onion in the pan bottom to cook in the drippings. Remove the mushrooms, but leave in the onion when making the gravy. Blend the drippings and onions together, then pour into the roux while stirring, or add the cornstarch slurry and bring to a gentle boil while stirring. Add the mushrooms before serving.

Carrots added to the roasting veggies will also add their own special flavor, as will garlic, and various herbs, such as rosemary. You can make spectacular gravy with just a little forethought. Play the flavors around in your head before adding them to the dish. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Enjoy.

Seeeeeeeya; Chief Longwind of the North

 

[Vanitas]

If you make a roux out of flour and the fat from the pan drippings, or butter, flour based gravies are a truly wonderful thing. There are no lumps, and no raw flour flavor. It's just another option.

I'm sure it is! Unfortunately Mom just adds more and more flour directly to the drippings. And then adds more flour. The end result is a watery flour soup.

You can make spectacular gravy with just a little forethought. Play the flavors around in your head before adding them to the dish. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Enjoy.

Seeeeeeeya; Chief Longwind of the North

I just have to add: the way you describe food in your posts always seems so... magical? Like you are creating a symphony of food.

Maybe I just need more coffee?

 

[Sir_Loin_of_Beef]

I have a stack of roasting pans and racks in various sizes in my cupboard, but since I bought my 18 quart Rival Roaster Oven (Nesco, Oster, and Hamilton Beach also make them) they have stayed in the cupboard. The roaster oven will roast turkeys, chickens, beef roasts and pork roasts to perfection, it's easy to clean, and on holidays it leaves the oven free for the important stuff, like the pies!

 

[Chief Longwind Of The North]

I'm sure it is! Unfortunately Mom just adds more and more flour directly to the drippings. And then adds more flour. The end result is a watery flour soup.


I just have to add: the way you describe food in your posts always seems so... magical? Like you are creating a symphony of food.

Maybe I just need more coffee?

That is an apt description of how food works for me. As a symphony is a blend of various sounds, blended together with timing and structure, to create something more than any one instrument (yes even more than a great pipe organ) can provide, so to it is with food. Each food we eat is a combination of flavors, as in bitter, sweet, sour, salt, and umami. The blending of these flavors creates a unique imprint in our brain that says, carrot, or potato, or stew, or whatever it is that we percieve as the flavor of something.

Great cooking is the management of various techniques, coupled with skillfull blending of already existing flavors to create something that is more than the individual foods and flavors.

But where music, even as it excites joy, exuberence, and emotions, uses on.ly the sense of sound, food uses the senses of sound, sight, taste, smell, and touch to excite and create joy, disgust, sate our appetite. Is it any wonder that we consider great cooking an art? And if we couple our artistic side, with the scientific, or engineering side of our brain, and learn to understand the cooking processes, and what they do to the foods, and We are then more able to create great food. The artistic side comes in the skillful blending of flavors to create something magical (not that I'm always so skillful, but I try). But that blending also uses scientific method, that is, think of something that might work (hypothesis), use various techniques expected to produce certain results (theory), make the food and taste it. Record the results (make a recipe if it tastes good).

Cooking satisfies my need for sustenance, for artistic creation, and for scientific invention. It also satisfies a need for social acceptance (people want me there to prepare meals, makes me feel good, and that I have worth not only to myself, but to others).

All in all, cooking, boiled down to its simplest form, is playtime, and fun.

Seeeeeeya; Chief Longwind of the North

 

[CWS4322]

Like Sir Loin of Beef, I have a stack of roasting pans (the enameled kind) of different sizes. I also have a Roaster Oven. For small roasts/chicken, I just select the pan that fits. I also have several Le Crueset DO and a couple of corningware roaster-type pans. I use the Roaster Oven for turkeys over 20 lb. I also use it to make lasagne.

 

[Chief Longwind Of The North]

A fairly versatile pot that will roast, braise, stew, and even bake a cobbler is a cast iron dutch oven, without the legs. With the lid, it will bake cakes, roast chickens, braise, make baked beans, stews, or slow cook a corned beef brisket. With the lid off, you can bake, smoke, roast, fry, and deep fry.

With a great to put it on, you can even cook outside over a campfire, or put it in a pit surrounded with hot coals.

If you season it properly, you can cook virtually anything that will fit inside it, including alkali and acidic foods. It will even work on an induction burner. It is nearly indestructible. It is ahevy though, and won't roast a turkey.

Seeeeeya; Chief Longwind of the North

 

[Twimum]

A fairly versatile pot that will roast, braise, stew, and even bake a cobbler is a cast iron dutch oven, without the legs. With the lid, it will bake cakes, roast chickens, braise, make baked beans, stews, or slow cook a corned beef brisket. With the lid off, you can bake, smoke, roast, fry, and deep fry.

With a great to put it on, you can even cook outside over a campfire, or put it in a pit surrounded with hot coals.

If you season it properly, you can cook virtually anything that will fit inside it, including alkali and acidic foods. It will even work on an induction burner. It is nearly indestructible. It is ahevy though, and won't roast a turkey.

Seeeeeya; Chief Longwind of the North

Thanks! I think I'll get a cast iron dutch oven but also a large cast iron roast pan to do the big roasts with vegetables.