The French National Assembly on Thursday unanimously adopted a bill aimed at restricting the manufacture and sale of products containing per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances — also known as PFAS or “forever chemicals.” The MPs, backed by the government, voted to exclude kitchen utensils from the scope of the text.
Thanks to an intense lobbying push, manufacturers of frying pans and saucepans — including the SEB group, which owns Tefal — are exempt from this ban under the proposed law penned by French Green MPs.
Majority groups initially tried to delay the ban on kitchen utensils until 2030 — a timetable refused by the French Green MPs who instead suggested an exemption until 2026.
Eh, at least this will reduce the amounts of PFAS being produced. I mean, teflon pans at least actually have a useful purpose, rather than things like PFAS coated burger wrappers.
Barely useful. Stainless steel and cast iron can achieve an almost equal non-stick effect, and handle much higher temperatures without toxic offgassing or stuff chipping off and ending up in the food.
Leaden flatware works too, but why use it when we have ceramic?
Teflon isn’t necessarily even easier to use than cast iron or stainless steel, I think the main issue there is that the education around how to use cookwear is very poor. It’s not just pop on the stove and go.
Yeah, I’ve never liked teflon either. The coating always seems to get scratched up no matter how careful you are with it (and some of those flakes end up in your food). But some people swear by it, so I could see them getting angry about a ban.
I use all those pans and love them but I have never gotten them to be remotely non stick for low heat cooking. They’re great at searing, and you should never sear in a non stick, but for low heat cooking I haven’t found anything that remotely comes close to Teflon.
That’s fair, I just kind of put up with the fact that they don’t.
I like french omelets and haven’t once come close to being able to make one successfully on anything but a non stick pan. Even chefs like Jacques Pepin uses them for dishes like that, and a lot of french dishes are low heat, so I understand why they’d want pans that can perform well for that. Personally, I’ve had my non sticks for many years now and they’re still in great condition because I take care of them. I don’t overheat them, I only use silicone or wood on them, and I hand wash them (because dishwashers can’t physically scrub, dishwasher detergents have abrasives in them to dislodge food from surfaces which will scratch up the pan and make it deteriorate. It’s also why you don’t put knives in the dishwasher.). Every time I’ve been over at someone’s house with bad quality non stick pans and observed them cook, they’ve been doing everything wrong, metal utensils, high heat, dishwasher. Those things will destroy your pans immediately, and you’re not going to know that unless you’re already into cooking, and another part of the problem is that the people who will benefit from the pans the most, are also people who aren’t good at cooking yet. Used correctly, they’re still a very good tool to have in your arsenal for many dishes for even an experienced cook.
I do think it’s a big problem that people use the pans incorrectly all the time, it’s bad for the environment to not take care of the stuff you own and have to trash them early, but that’s true in general. In the case of non stick pans it’s extra bad because of the chemicals used in them and that they also will impact your health since the fumes that can be produced by using them wrong is dangerous, so maybe these pans need to come with instruction manuals, or maybe people are just too irresponsible for us to have nice things, but I personally really like them for a lot of specific dishes that they excel at, all dishes that require non stick at low heats.
Almost as good and much bigger pain to use? Yeah, great deal lol
Cast iron: cook a load of bacon bacon before you try making tomato sauce and don’t put it in a dishwasher. Trying not to scratch Teflon is way more of a pain.
We just have plastic and wood utensils for cooking. I guess it would be a pain if you had metal ones
I just would probably avoid a tomato sauce in cast iron, high carbon steel, or aluminum pans. That’s what stainless is for.
It’s fine if you’re quick about it, or if you’re willing to re-do the patina. That is, there’s a huge difference in stripping between frying up some cut-up tomatoes a minute before you dump noodles into the pan, and reducing a tomato sauce.
It really isn’t that big a pain if you know how to use them. Carbon steel is also a fantastic option.
Right
Exactly, this’ll limit the exposure to them in things you wouldn’t expect them to be on/in. You can avoid Teflon pans and go iron or steel but the amount of stuff coated in PFAS is ridiculous. Hell, even sofas, rugs, blinds, etc all sorts of stuff. And before anyone says “you don’t eat that stuff”, try telling my toddlers that! I bought a black milk frothing jug for my espresso machine. The black coating? Teflon. Not mentioned anywhere, not even marketed as non-stick.
Yes, any positive change is good.
Its just that economy/corporations are politically too powerful to make changes at speed we actually can (phase out PFAS). So the process is slower. And people die for profits of some, not to mention accumulation of that nasty stuff in various natural habitats.