De Buyer MINERAL B Carbon Steel Crepe & Tortilla Pan – 12” Diameter, 10” Cooking Surface – Ideal for Making & Reheating Crepes, Tortillas & Pancakes – PFAS, PFOA & PFOS Free – Made in France

We got rid of our coated non-stick cookware many years ago, and switched to using only stainless steel. We’ve had good luck with theEmeril stainless cookware, which has been durable and useful. For example, when using butter in the stainless Emeril pan, I can cook an omelette and have it release by just jostling the pan. Not really non-stick (stainless never is), but it worked well enough.Until now, that is. We’re cutting back on our use of butter, and have taken to using a light mist of oil (like grapeseed) in our cooking. However, using oil on stainless simply does not impart the same slippery effect as butter (or lard), so eggs and other foods stick instead of releasing.After some investigation, I found these DeBuyer iron pans, which are thinner and lighter than cast iron, but which claim to have exceptional non-stick capabilities without any added polymer coatings. And they work GREAT. These are less heavy than cast iron, but are still quite substantial, made from very thick and durable iron.They come with a coating of bees wax, which prevents rusting during storage and shipment. Removing the bees wax is a bit of a pain, and I resorted to filling a sink with boiling water and submerging them to melt off the wax, then wiping away any residual coating. Even though this initial cleaning is pain, it’s a one time thing and it’s a natural coating, so still preferable to polymer-based non-stick cookware.The next step is to season the pan, which involves putting a shallow layer of oil in the pan, heating it until the oil begins to smoke, then pouring it out. This step was relatively easy, and again is a one-time thing.After that, the pan is ready to use. The first thing I made was a thin, five egg omelette, cooked with only a thin misted layer of grapeseed oil in the pan. The eggs released easily, cooked evenly, and the omelette came out perfect.The manufacturer recommends cleaning with hot water and a sponge (no soap, no abrasives, etc), and they clean up well that way. Then, similar to cast iron, you wipe a little oil on them and put them away until the next use. The oil prevents rusting if you don’t use them for a while. These pans are similar to cast iron in that they season as you use them, and the non-stick properties get better the more you use them.Are they as non-stick as teflon? Not quite, but close enough to work for almost any typical cooking need. Are they more trouble to clean and store? Yes, they do require a little care and feeding. Can you put them in the dishwasher? Well, you can, but it will strip the seasoning and encourage rusting, so you don’t want to do that.However, they are made of iron, and that’s it. No polymer coating to flake off and ingest. No poisonous fumes to emit and cause harm (check the warnings for using non-stick cookware around birds, for example). And we’re able to cook everything with a thin layer of misted oil, and so far nothing has stuck even slightly. We highly recommend this cookware, particularly if you’re looking to get rid of polymer-coated pans due to potential health issues.Update: The bad news is that after 11 months of regular use one of our two pans warped. The worse news is that I was unable to find any US-based support contact info for the manufacturer, and their offices in France never returned my calls, online requests, or emails. The good news is that I contacted Amazon to see if they had US-based support contact info, and they offered (unsolicited) to replace the pan for me. So, I’ll call that a push and leave the five star rating, but watch out for warping and be sure to never introduce sudden temperature changes to the pans.