/ck/ - Food & Cooking

>>12666148
>>12664677

The point is that this interlocking between grain boundary and food is why we cook with oil. Cooking oils are usually quite a bit more viscous than water at room temperature but when heated to around 300º F (150º C) they become a good deal less so. This allows oil to form extremely thin layers on the surface of your hot pan and create an interface between the metal’s craggy grain boundaries and your food. Seasoning is simply an elaboration of this technique.

Seasoning works for two reasons. First, it maintains an affinity for oils, allowing any fat you use in a seasoned pan to spread out into an even layer. Second, the seasoning effectively reduces the surface area of the pan by shellacking over the craggy surface of the metal, reducing friction between food and cooking surface and eliminating the tendency of food cooked on bare metal to interlock with the metal’s grain boundaries. Picture unrelated.