Last night after dinner, I cleaned up my kitchen so it would be pretty for the brunch. At 10p (pretty late for this tired mama), I realized I had not yet sauteed the pear/leek filling for my turnovers ... this would not only keep me up later, but also grease up my lovely clean hearth area. It's just some oil spatter that would have to be wiped up, of course, but I was still annoyed.
At this point I remembered that, although induction manufacturers do not officially endorse this method, it's generally considered "ok" to put something in between pan and the induction surface to save yourself some cleaning downstream. Induction tops cook with magnetic forces, so the paper in between cooktop and vessel should not catch on fire. I figured I'd give it a try.
I took a brown paper grocery bag and split it at the seams and laid it out over my induction top (Miele KM5753):
I sauteed my leeks and pears in browned butter (hungry yet?):
This is the butter that eventually splattered out of the pan (or that dripped as I removed the filling to a bowl):
After removing the brown paper and throwing it away, here is my nice smooth, clean induction top. No additional cleaning for the party!
I certainly wouldn't use this brown paper method all the time... it seems very wasteful when, typically, I can just use one of my cleaning cloths to wipe up any messes. In a time crunch, however, this was a great solution. If I was doing some heavy duty frying, with a veritable mess of food and oil, then I might consider this approach as well.
8 comments:
v. cool. I'm definitely interested in induction for the next house. I do like my fire, lol, but I like the pros you outlined in a previous post.
Have you tried using using Silpat mats underneath/around? I've read that works well, too.
btw, I'd have gone the paper bag route, too, as the silpats would still have to be cleaned. I'm just wondering if they work for other spillover type cooking.
Do you find the cooktop surface pretty scratch resistant? One of the posts I read about using Silpat mats underneath were for protecting the cooktop from heavy pans/scratching. Is that even necessary?
Neat idea! However, I was very much drawn in to your backsplash. Who did you get the tile from?
@plumbtile -- the backsplash is Stone and Pewter's fallingwater series, in Prairie, purchased from mosaicsource. http://mosaicsource.com/prairiefallingwater.aspx
@mom2reese - I didn't try the silpat mat yet. My silpat mat is smaller than my braiser so wouldn't contain much oil splatter. I have not particularly babied my induction surface and do not see any scratches. I guess a very rough bottomed cast iron pan might cause me concern, but using enameled cast iron and stainless steel, primarily... I don't have any scratch concerns. You can play around with that when you visit. :)
I do clean in between uses, though. If I left lots of dirt on the top and then used my pans, I guess I would be more worried?
That paper trick is straight out of a Wolf seminar I went to last year. It's counter intuitive, but it works beautifully --for bacon particularly. The Ceran top on an induction cooktop is the same surface that's on any electric cooktop sold these days. I wouldn't worry too much about scratching it.
What a great idea... at least, in a pinch!
Great visual example of the benefits of induction.
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