“Ceramic” is a broad term that encompasses many materials, but in the realm of nonstick cookware, it refers to a hard material that’s a relative of beach sand. A single layer of a substance called “sol-gel” made with silicon (the element—not silicone, the soft, rubbery material) is typically sprayed onto the pan and secured by a one-step baking process. Traditional nonstick coatings are made from PTFE, which is one of a class of compounds called fluoropolymers; they’re sprayed onto the metal pan base or spread on with rollers. Multiple coats are typically applied, and there are several oven-curing stages. One of the reasons manufacturers usually tout ceramic pans as “green” is their shorter production process relative to PTFE pans, which, they reason, uses less energy because it takes less time.
But the two coatings are not created equal. Pans with ceramic coatings wore faster during our cooking tests, and the coatings on two of the pans flaked off in pieces as big as ⅛ inch wide after we subjected them to thermal shock, heating and then rapidly cooling them in an ice bath (an abuse test designed to mimic the stress put on the pan when it’s placed in the sink or run under water too soon after cooking).
Leave a comment and join the conversation!