To Find the Best Cast Iron Skillets, I Seared Steaks, Baked Cornbread, and Fried Dozens of Eggs

They’re cast out of an alloy of iron, carbon, and silicon that is sanded and sometimes pre-seasoned.the grill or over a fire pit. I’ve used cast iron for years and have yet to find a crack or sign of wear—they’re that solid.

To find the best ones for cookware geeks and the cast iron-trepidatious alike, I tested 15 cast iron skillets. A 10- to 10.25-inch skillet will serve most people well—it’s the perfect size for frying up some eggs, flipping a few pancakes, or searing steaks.

A 12-inch skillet, for example, is large enough for a family of four or for more substantial servings (not to mention many recipes call for a 12-inch skillet). For example, I like using my 12-inch, dual-handled Lodge cast iron skillet for cookery pancakes or shallow-frying; its spacious preparation surface lets me cook more in one go.

The Yeti cast iron skillet I tested was the 12-inch model, so it was a little heavier and larger than most of the 10-inch ones, but I didn’t count that against it. Finally, an enameled cast iron skillet has a cast iron core that’s coated in, well, enamel. This makes it more nonstick out of the box, and it doesn’t require seasoning.

Rub the entire skillet with a neutral, high-smoke point oil (canola oil works) and place it in the oven for 30 minutes. All of the cast iron skillets I tested have a pre-seasoned option.In this case, you don’t need to do any more seasoning off the bat—you can get cookery and let that seasoning grow over time.

One difference between old-school and new-school cast iron skillets is the color and texture of the pans. The pan’s color reflects its seasoning: The darker it is, the more seasoned it is. (Seasoning is a buildup of polymerized fat, which creates a nonstick surface.) The brass-colored pans I tested (from Lancaster, Stargazer, and Smithey) were pre-seasoned, just perhaps not quite as much as the pitch-black Lodge and Victoria.

That explained, the Lancaster and Stargazer were still quite nonstick—even fried eggs released easily. “All new Lancaster Cast Iron pans come with two coats of seasoning and are ready to use right out of the box,” explains Mark Longenecker, co-founder of Lancaster. “The seasoning on the pan is what gives the cast iron skillet the beautiful copper or bronze hue. Lodge’s pans, for example, tend to be pebbly while newcomers like Lancaster and Field Company sell polished skillets inspired by cast iron pans of yore. “When we think of modern-day cast iron, we often think of heavy or rough pans that are challenging to clean and are relatively slow to heat up and cool down. Smooth and lightweight cast iron is not only easier to handle, especially when filled with food, but it is in addition easier to clean, responds more quickly to heat, and will still have all the amazing benefits of cast iron, such as durability and heat retention.

Since smoother skillets tend to be more expensive), so, today, you have brands like Lancaster that sell slightly less seasoned, smooth skillets and others, like Lodge, that sell heavily seasoned, rougher skillets; both styles released foods well in my tests, so it’s more a matter of personal preference (and rate. And while it’s true you need to thoroughly dry a cast iron pan after washing (yes, you can wash it with plain old plate soap and a sponge) and give it a swipe of oil, it’ll maybe add 30 seconds to your dish-cleaning routine.

Heat Conduction Varied, But Didn’t Matter Much While it’s true that cast iron isn’t a great conductor, I still wanted to get a feel for how quickly the skillets heated up. Five saw an average temperature gain of 34% after one minute, while the Lodge Cast Iron Skillet -10.25 inch went up by a whopping 53.4%.

In the first minute, the Smithey No.10 Skillet and the Smithey No.10 Chef Skillet were the slowest, mounting by 18% and 13.6%, respectively.