Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

Nope, it's cuz Lindy stir-frys. Lindy has used cheap non-sticks skillets, expensive non-stick skillets and was considering the ones that cost a bomb in Williams-Sonoma (Lindy like shiny...oooh..., aaah...) when the kindly and knowledgeable saleswoman informed her that there was not a non-stick skillet on the market that could tolerate daily stir-fry even with the temperature correctly set to medium heat (err....yeah....) for much more than a year. This tallied exactly and precisely with Lindy's experience with non-stick coatings, no matter the price. Sigh. Lindy is not made of money. Sigh. So at the nearest Wally World, Lindy found this skillet in the clearance section without the instructions for seasoning. Half price. Score! A quick internet search netted much advice for seasoning the pan. Update (11/23/12): Here's the classic method for seasoning a pan. From the Lodge website: "Re-Seasoning your Lodge Cast Iron While maintaining the seasoning (as in Step 5 above) should keep your Cast Iron in good condition, at some point you may need to repeat the seasoning process. If food sticks to the surface, or you notice a dull, gray color, repeat the seasoning process: Wash the cookware with hot, soapy water and a stiff brush. (It is okay to use soap this time because you are preparing to re-season the cookware). Rinse and dry completely. Apply a thin, even coating of MELTED solid vegetable shortening (or cooking oil of your choice) to the cookware (inside and out). Place aluminum foil on the bottom rack of the oven to catch any dripping. Set oven temperature to 350 - 400 degrees F. Place cookware upside down on the top rack of the oven. Bake the cookware for at least one hour. After the hour, turn the oven off and let the cookware cool in the oven. Store the cookware uncovered, in a dry place when cooled." Other internet sites are big fans of bacon grease. Simply put, you will need some kind of solid fat that can take very high heat in order to season the pan. Lindy knows that Crisco will take very high heat and is easier to obtain than bacon grease. Lindy doesn't eat bacon because of her high cholesterol. Not that Lindy EVER burns food in her spiffy frypan but should this happen to you, scrap/soak/remove as much as possible, then place the pan on the burner set to max heat. The heat will burn off the crud and the pan will not rust. You can add salt to the pan and use it as an abrasive to help scrub off the food bits as they carbonize. Re-seasoning at this point is useful but not utterly necessary. Lindy would like to give credit where credit is due and report that Lindy's Mommy taught her this trick. If you don't re-season, you'll just need more oil than usual until the seasoning builds up again. Once this happens, eggs don't stick. Steaks sear on the outside and are juicy on the inside. Lindy can break her diet and make fried rice. Use one of those plastic bottles with a tiny tip to drip oil in as needed and your food won't be too much fattier than using regular non-stick. But Lindy is very scared for her toes if she ever drops the pan. Never use one hand to move it. Update 11/23/12: Here's the method using flaxseed oil that is sweeping the foodie blogosphere: Use flaxseed oil (from healthfood, or vitamin store) to season the pan. Be warned - flaxseed oil is amazingly expensive; the price on Amazon is less than the healthfood stores but not by a whole lot. Some people note the chemical similarity between flaxseed and the very cheap linseed oil but LINSEED OIL is TOXIC. No substitutions. Ventilate the area. The smoke is mild but it builds up as you keep working. Strip off any old seasoning using procedure mentioned above. The salt reduces smoking as you burn off the coating. The cast iron will turn a silvery gray as the seasoning is removed. Let cool. Pre-heat oven to 500 degrees. You want about 5-7 coats of oil on your skillet, so repeat this as many times as needed. Don't think about trying this with 1-2 really thick coats of oil. It won't season evenly or smoothly. You'll lose a lot of your costly oil as it drips off the pan during the baking procedure. Coat your pan with the thinnest possible coat of flaxseed oil. Try to apply evenly. Avoid any drips, if the oil sets inside your oven or other equipment it will be a nightmare to remove. Put a sheet of disposable aluminum foil in case of drips below the skillet. Bake the skillet for 1/2 hour. Repeat for however many times as you desire. By the last coat, the seasoning will have a soft, tacky feel, like you could scrape it off with a metal utensil. If you turn off the oven and leave the piece in place until the oven cools off on it's own, it should have hardened into a black and very, very shiny layer. It will be as shiny as black nail polish. Observations about flaxseed oil seasoning performance. 1) It's hard but not indestructible. I was unable to scratch it with the back of a knife but scouring with steel wool did remove some of the seasoning eventually. 2) You can leave it sitting it water and it is protected. No rust. 3) you can clean the pan in the dishwasher. Not sure how many times you can repeat this before you need to re-season. 4) The surface has a smooth non-oily feel but it is not non-stick. You must use a little oil to prevent sticking. Clean up is very easy, stuff come right off. The pans have not been in use long enough to build up a second layer from bacon/crisco/daily use. 5) The flaxseed surface sticks more than the traditional seasoning surface. This may be a highly unfair comparison because the flaxseed surface is only a few days old and the traditional seasoning surface was a few years old. I will update this comparison if performance changes over time. Update July 17, 2015 - The flaxseed oil coating is still going on one frypan! Yes, the original application from 2012. I overheated the other pan and it has some dead spots where the coating burned off. Just kept cooking on it and seasoning developed over the missing spots. But you do have to be careful cleaning the seasoning. It isn't as tough as flaxseed. Don't scrub too hard with non-scratch cleaning pads. So why is the flaxseed coating better than regular seasoning? It's easier to remove burned stuff from the pan without destroying the layer of seasoning every time.