Both skillets and frypans can be made from various materials such as cast iron and stainless steel. What sets them apart is that frypans are usually made from stainless steel, aluminium, copper, and ceramic.

Maintenance and Care:

Baking and Roasting: These skillets are versatile enough to be used for baking and roasting, making them suitable for preparing dishes such as cornbread, roasted vegetables, and even desserts like skillet cookies and cobblers.

What Is A Frying Pan?

Choose the frypan if you want something that is lightweight, easy to use daily, and offers versatility to cook delicate recipes. But if you're adventurous in the kitchen, enjoy cooking outdoors, have a larger budget and want cookware that lasts over a lifetime, choose the skillet.

Though stainless steel started in the 1930s and continued after World War II, stainless frying pans were only mass-marketed in the 1950s. Companies concentrating on cookware produced the first stainless steel frying pans.

Blue Enamel Cooking Pots And Orange Enamel Cast Iron Cookware

Stainless steel frying pans are also induction-ready. This means that they can be used on an induction cooker, which uses magnetic energy to heat the pan directly.

Once you've decided which frying pan material you need, the next step is to figure out the pan size. Frying pans come in different sizes, with 8-, 10-, and 12-inch being the most popular sizes across the industry. The smaller the pan size is, the faster it heats up and evenly distributes the heat, but the faster it will lose its heat. While it may seem like a larger pan size is always better, some foods, such as eggs, benefit from cooking in a smaller, more contained space. We have listed the most common commercial frying pan sizes below and what they are best for:

    The features of a cast iron Dutch oven are also worth noting.  Its durability and heat-retaining properties make it ideal for slow cooking and long stewing.  Dutch Oven Material distributes heat evenly, ensuring food cooks evenly and without hot spots.  Additionally, a Dutch oven can be used on the stovetop, in the oven, or even over an open flame, making it a versatile tool in any kitchen.

Best for: Almost any food that needs searing, including steak and burgers. Cast-iron pans are ovenproof, so you can use them to roast meats like beef or pork and to bake cornbread, deep-dish pizza, shepherd’s pie, and more. And they retain heat so well that they’re a good choice for deep-frying chicken, doughnuts, or other foods because they keep the oil at a constant temperature.

The details: Cast-iron frying pans are practically indestructible, and they’re handed down for generations in many families. That makes their typically low price even more attractive. And if well cared for, cast iron develops a patina that releases food almost as well as nonstick. But the pans are heavy, and you have to be patient when heating them up because they don’t come up to temperature fast. Once they do, however, they retain heat.

Our tests of coated and uncoated cast-iron pans show how versatile this cookware can be. We sear steaks, brown scallops, and bake cornbread to see how well a cast-iron pan works for home cooks. The best pans ace all these tests. We also judge how easy they are to clean. Because of the enamel coating, the coated pans are a bit easier to clean than the uncoated ones.

Here are two recommended cast-iron pans from our tests.