Why Does food stick on a stainlessness steel pan?

Question

I follow the instructions for proper use of a stainless steel pan but for whatever reason, I find that food still sticks so I get discouraged from using it. I am not sure if I’m doing something wrong 🤔

Any tips or tricks are greatly appreciated <3

In: Other

Answer 1

I understand cast iron. I have never made things not stick to stainless steel.

I get the Physics of it. That I can explain. The stainless steel is still “porous”. That means it has tiny holes in it. Food sticks because bits of the food seep down into those holes. Imagine sticking your fingers in a bowling ball. The food does that.

Supposedly if the steel is “hot enough” the pores are supposed to be too big for food to stick well. And supposedly the chemical reactions that happen after food is cooked are supposed to cause it to “release”. So if food is sticking, it implies the cookware wasn’t hot enough and the food was not finished cooking.

In practice? I find food just sticks to it. Maybe you need high-quality chef-grade stainless steel. But it seems to me like a lot of chefs use carbon steel instead, which takes seasoning layers much like cast iron. That means they literally *burn* oil onto it until the oil fills the pores and turns into a layer sort of like a varnish. No pores means the food can’t stick. Stainless steel’s pores can’t do that. They’re too big for the oil to “stick” and form a seasoning layer.