Carbon steel

What it is

Carbon steel is sheet steel that's about 99 percent iron and 1 percent carbon, pressed into a pan and seasoned like cast iron. It sears like cast iron at a pound or two less, and it asks for the same drying and oiling.

Why it matters in your kitchen

Picture a steak hitting a hot pan and staying loud. Carbon steel holds enough heat to brown it, and a well-seasoned one is smooth enough that eggs slide.

Then there's the lift. Serious Eats' Daniel Gritzer weighed two 12-inch skillets at home: cast iron at 7 pounds 4 ounces, carbon steel at 5 pounds 10 ounces.

What touches your food is the seasoning, oil baked onto the steel, plus bare metal where it's thin. New pans often ship with a beeswax film that you wash off first.

Good at

• Searing. Maker de Buyer says it holds heat like cast iron and takes high temperatures, which is what a steak crust needs.
• Eggs and crepes, once seasoned. Gritzer says a perfectly seasoned carbon steel pan releases better than a perfectly seasoned modern cast iron pan, because the pressed surface is smoother.
• A pan you can toss. de Buyer's 11-inch omelette pan weighs 4.6 pounds and its 8-inch weighs 2.3.
• Any cooktop. de Buyer lists gas, electric, ceramic and induction.
• Price. Gritzer says even the larger sizes rarely go over $100.

Watch for

• Leave it wet and it rusts. Scrub the rust off, rinse, dry the pan and season it again, which is de Buyer's own fix.
• Long acidic cooking strips it. Gritzer says not to reduce a bottle of wine or make tomato sauce in it. Use stainless or enamel for those.
• It heats unevenly. Gritzer calls carbon steel and cast iron poor conductors, hot over the flame and cooler a short way out. Preheat longer and use a burner that matches the base.
• The first weeks are blotchy. de Buyer says the pan darkens and performs better with every use. Cook fatty things early, like bacon or potatoes, and keep at it.
• Handles set the oven limit. The de Buyer omelette pan we read has an epoxy-coated handle rated for the oven only briefly, up to 400°F for under 10 minutes. Check yours before it goes in.

Who it suits

Good for you if you sear a lot, want something lighter than cast iron and don't mind a minute of drying and oiling. Skip it if you want to use the dishwasher or simmer tomato sauce in your skillet.

In short. Carbon steel sears like cast iron at a pound or two lighter, gets slicker the more you cook in it, and rusts if you leave it wet.

Seasoning is a coating, and we label it as one: see seasoning. For what research has and hasn't shown about iron pans, see our guide. To check a pan you own, try our cookware material lookup.

Where it is used

• Fry pans and skillets
• Woks
• Crepe and omelette pans

How to care for it

• Before first use, wash off the factory beeswax with hot water and a sponge.
• Season it: a thin coat of high smoke point oil, heat until it smokes lightly, let it cool. Repeat a few times.
• After cooking, rinse with hot water, wipe, dry completely on the burner and rub in a little oil.
• Never the dishwasher, and never leave it to soak.
• Makers differ on soap. de Buyer says skip it. Lodge says warm soapy water is fine on seasoned iron, and we'd follow your pan's maker.