After the pandemic, many people started taking their health more seriously. Everywhere you look on social media, an expert is weighing in on the most beneficial ways to eat better.
We’re encouraged to try Keto, incorporate intermittent fasting, avoid meat, eat more fish, get in more veggies, and so on.
I needed to lose some fat and eat healthier because diabetes runs in my family. My dad passed away from kidney disease, including complications from taking years of medication to control his cholesterol. I didn’t want to end up like him.
In the thick of my research for healthier eating, I came across Saladmaster owner, Jennifer V, who said, “What we’re cooking is just as important as what we’re cooking in. So, depending on the cookware, you can buy the best organic food and turn it into poison.”
I did more research and learned the type of cookware we use can add chemicals to our food, which affects our food’s nutrient retention and flavors.
Choose Your Poison
- Non-Stick cookware is made out of Teflon. Teflon surfaces break down and end up in your food, along with damaging chemicals and heavy metals from our cookware.
- Stainless steel releases heavy metals such as chrome and nickel into your cooking food.
- Ceramic enamel coating is coated in enamel or paint. Cooking your food surface in ceramic cookware releases toxins into your food and can cause neurological damage to your nervous system.
Will Your Cookware Pass the Test?
If you’d like to test the level of chemicals or metals excreting from your cookware, you can do a simple cookware toxicity pollution test as follows:
- Take a sample of each of the different types of cookware you are using and add 1 cup of water
- Adjust the water with 1 tbsp of baking soda (sodium bicarbonate is used to simulate a similar PH level often realized in cooking conditions).
- Bring water to a boil for 5-10 min (your food is usually exposed to the pan for 10 min or more.)
- Add 1 tbsp sodium bicarbonate to a glass of warm water, stir, & taste (your control should taste extremely salty, like the baking soda you brush your teeth with)
- Taste water in each of the other pans (taste will range from very bitter to metallic to burnt rubber tires to a mouthful of dirty nickels.
Here are my results:
So, I tried out some baking soda on our stainless steel, ceramic, and coated pans, just to see what would happen. Turns out, they all gave off this super bitter, chemical taste in the baking soda mix.
It was especially noticeable in the stainless steel pan, and get this—it had only been used twice before!
But then, I tried it in the Saladmaster saucepan we used for the experiment, and guess what? The baking soda’s taste stayed the same. I thought it was concerning how the other pans tasted differently.
While Saladmaster is a bit on the pricier side, it passes the cookware test, leaves off any added chemicals from my cooking, and helps to retain all my food’s flavors so well that I don’t need to add more salt or fish sauce to my meals.
If health is wealth, then Saladmaster is worth the investment.