Bayou classic Cast Iron Pots

Made in China.
A little misleading with a name like Bayou Classic huh?

The Chinese stuff will cook fine. It might come from melted down engine blocks, but it will cook just fine.

For American made cast iron, or European-made cast iron, you are going to buy from Lodge, pay high prices, or search for vintage cast iron at estate sales and thrift stores.

Lodge is alright, but it tends to be heavier than most. Most Lodge pieces are pre-seasoned and have a rougher surface than the vintage stuff. I have some Lodge pieces and I strip them and re-season them. Some even sand down the cooking surface to make them smoother. And, not all the Lodge stuff is made in the USA. I think the enameled pieces are made in China.

Some of the European stuff is made in Europe, but not all of it is. It's usually pretty pricey, compared to Lodge. I have an enameled steel brazier from a German company that works pretty well and is lighter than cast iron.

Most of the pieces I have came from estate sales or Goodwill. I find a piece I like and re-season it. Probably have a dozen pieces now. The collectible stuff, from Griswold and Wagner, is pretty expensive, but I look for things made by BSR or other, lessor known places. I'm interested in cooking, not showing off a collection.

Am I the only one in here that uses SOLIDTEKNICS? Ever since I found it a few years ago on kickstarter it has been my go to skillet for everything except eggs

I appreciate the few who say that Cast Iron all cooks the same.

Technically Iron has alloys, but most of the iron that is used for casting is close to the same, other than thickness, which may not even affect the rate of heat transfer, once the pan gets hot. A scientist of Metallurgy may claim to be able to run an iron sample through a flame photometer and tell you the iron was likely to have come from upper Michigan, rather than West Virginia. My belief is both iron ore locations make good iron. I don't have the space here or time today to talk about iron that is moving toward steel and how much of a cast iron pan is iron and how much is the coke infused oxygen enriched stuff we call steel.

Of course, properly seasoning cast iron is key, because the smooth surface everyone wants can come from age and a lot of use, even when the brand-new pan seems rough. I personally have nothing against sanding down the cooking surface to smooth it since I am not looking to acquire a valuable collection of Griswald stuff. I have too many pieces of nicely seasoned Lodge or whatever to begin throwing money at Griswald or other antique pieces.

Said too much already.

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Don’t they have bayous in China?

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where else would they get their crawfish from?