Tag: Shopping Advice

The quest for a nonstick pan that can actually stay nonstick for the long haul can feel, well, kind of futile. Get a new pan, then fall in love as your eggs go slipping and sliding onto your plate — but give it just a few months and you’re back to chiseling bits off the bottom again. Of course, failing to care for the pans properly is a big reason why they just don’t last that long (back away from the metal utensils!), but it’s just a matter of fact that, eventually, the coatings will get stickier over time. In addition, concerns about chemicals in PTFE (aka Teflon) coatings getting vaporized into the air at high temperatures has lured many shoppers away from traditional nonstick. Although these coatings are deemed safe and have been free of harmful PFOAs since around 2015, consumers are still wary.

Ceramic cookware has emerged as one of the most popular alternatives, but it’s known to lose its nonstick properties after just a few months of use. So when Material Kitchen, one of the many Kitchn favorite direct-to-consumer cookware brands, launched a nonstick a Teflon-free pan purported to last 37 times longer than ceramic last year, well I just had to try it out. And guess what? It’s just as good as new, after a year plus of daily use. But the good news doesn’t stop there! You can get ahold of this MVP pan for 20 percent off on Material’s site right now from now until November 29. All you need to do is add the essential to your cart (along with maybe the brand’s fan-favorite reBoard and our editor-loved knives, they shouldn’t be missed) and score the discount, easy!

When I unboxed it all those months ago, I also couldn’t help noticing how pretty it is, with its shiny stainless-steel bottom and emerald green surface. In a sea of black and gray, this 10.5-inch sauté pan is quite fetching.

The first time I held the essential, I noticed it’s decently heavy for a nonstick pan. At 2.78 pounds, it’s just a little lighter than an All-Clad skillet of the same size (by comparison the 10-inch nonstick skillets I already had in my cabinets were closer to 2 pounds 4 ounces). It makes sense considering the pan is built similarly — 5-ply construction with a copper core for even heating. (For what it’s worth, Material’s Coated Pan is decently more expensive than cheap-o nonstick pans but at least half the price of an All-Clad.) If you like a super lightweight nonstick pan this might not be the one for you, but I loved how substantial it felt and figured its heft meant there’s less chance this pan is going to warp.

The company calls the coating “mineral nonstick,” fume-free, as well as PFOA-free (again, all nonstick pans are now), Teflon-free, lead-free, and cadmium-free. It’s reinforced with stainless steel, which is why it lasts so much longer than ceramic. And don’t forget, it has that copper core. I’ve used it every day for a year and a half and it’s still as slippery as the day I took it out of the box. 

The pan heats up fast. In a test of how quickly it heated a cup of water compared to other nonstick and ceramic pans, using the same burner and same flame level for all, the Coated Pan clocked in at less than a minute, while the others took about 30 seconds longer to get the water simmering. It was also noticeably more even in its heat. The water began simmering evenly all around the edges almost at the same time. The other pans started in one area and it took longer for the heat to spread. 

I cooked pancakes without any oil or butter in the pan and they cooked perfectly golden and even, with no sticking. Even when I added sliced bananas and chocolate chips there was no sticking. I also fried up a bunch of eggs and made omelettes and crepes and they all slid out perfectly. When frying tofu not a single cube stuck and they cooked up crisp and evenly golden from the center to the very edge of the pan. And because the pan is oven safe to 500 degrees, I was able to cook up a frittata and let it get a finishing stint in the oven.

Supremely even heat, a truly nonstick surface, and a beauty to look at. All in all, I’m very impressed with the Coated Pan. In fact, it might just be my favorite piece of cookware I’ve owned to date.

Do you have a favorite nonstick pan? Tell us about it in the comments below.