Le Creuset

[Pumpkittenspice]

Is Le Creuset cookware worth the price tag?

I’ve got the Le Creuset salt and pepper mills and a utensil jar (in the shell pink colourway, if anyone was wondering) which I love. I’d love to have a casserole dish and a baking dish too!

A lady after my own heart ❤️

Can confirm the menopausal sore/weak wrists shoulders and hands(!) thing is real. I love the gorgeous colours, but prefer my much lighter stainless steel from Stellar.

3 x LC casserole dishes of various sizes. Used several times a week. I’ve also got the griddle pan that only comes out a couple of times per year. Some of them are over 30 years old. Yes, they are heavy, but a little weights session whilst you’re making dinner is good.

@LaSourciereEfrontee I also have a kitchen aid artisan mixer, denby crockery, magi mix food processor. Dualit toaster and smeg coffee maker. Pretensious wanker. Moi? 😀

I ruined a whole dishwasher full of Denby a few years ago by using the wrong tablets, so now have inexpensive plain white crocks. 🤷

How? What tablet? Denby is indestructible.

I bought a box of Finish tablets in a discount store. Had Greek or Spanish info on them. Anyway, used them twice before realising the glaze was coming off my plates and mugs. DH did translate and turns out the tablets had different formulation. Left stuff with large patches of no or thin glaze. Lesson learnt about products with non English text on.

Oven cleaner

lol what

What an absurd thing to say.

I have a couple of my mum’s that are still going strong 30+ years on. I don’t find them better day to day than the cheap knock offs I bought but they last and last.

My late husband bought the classic orange set of saucepans long before I met him and they're still going strong. As I've inherited them and am a Boomer as well, that probably makes me even more of an MN wanker.

I'll soon be 70 and manage the huge casserole bought in the 90s for £1 at a summer fair.

Aldi knock-offs are perfectly good.

I’ve still got my casserole from my first wedding in 1992! They are brilliant for stews etc and last forever.

My MIL has had them for years. She struggles to lift them a little now - although she is 96!

A cheerful thought! 🤣

Found a Le Creuset teapot in a charity shop for £3 and sold it for a £15 profit on eBay, I'd say it was worth it.

I have a small Dutch oven that is older than I am and will outlive me. I have a few other things like casserole dishes that have been gifts or picked up second hand. I think it is certainly worth the hype and the expense. The only drawback, as pp have mentioned, is weight. I looked at their big frying pans when my IKEA one needed replaced and I couldn't lift it with one hand.

Enough of us now have said too heavy.

We cant all be wrong.

I’ve got a Denby cast iron casserole dish & lid as well as a larger flatter round casserole type one which is an Aldi copy of le Crueset.
I love them and think the food is better when cooked in them, it’s tender and stays moist .
But I wouldn’t pay the extortionate le crueset prices . These copies do me just fine .

I have a griddle and two round casseroles, 24cm and 28cm. The 24cm is probably my most used out of all my pans, it’s the perfect size for a stew or veg curry for 4-6 and the big one is great for batch cooking. Not sure the knock off versions usually go up to 28cm. If you’re looking for them a bit cheaper try ecookshop, harts of stur or an outlet - there’s one in Bicester village.

I love that they can go from my induction hob to the oven and nothing sticks, they are so easy to clean (I only don’t put them in the dishwasher is ours is only a slimline one and a single casserole would take up a whole rack). I don’t find them too heavy - the way I think about it is if you do exercise as part of your daily life then you don’t have to go to the gym, which is how people lived a few generations ago!

I'm 57 and have no problems lifting them. My conclusion is it's down to fitness not age.
I now want a cast iron roasting dish because I can't make gravy on the induction hob with the aluminium one we have.
Off to look at eBay.

I also think when using a LeC casserole and you put it in the oven for slow cooking, you use a far far lower temperature... my casseroles are cooked on either 120 or 130.

Maybe we are all average and you are demonically strong?

I have two cast iron casserole dishes, they are too heavy and spend most of their time in the cupboard. But I do have baking trays and a brilliant toughened non stick shallow casserole that I use a lot. Excellent quality and still like new. Much more user friendly. So is it worth it, yes. But select the right pan
for the job.

I can't lift LC these days so it's all gone, I am replacing with their stainless pans when I get my new hob.

I didn't know it was wanky to have a KitchenAid, but I was certainly a mug to buy one. The lid of my food processor is now held together by superglue. I stupidly bought a limited edition cast metal one and parts are unavailable in this country. Also, it is impossible to clean. I miss my 1970s Magimix Grande Cuisine, it was wonderful. I gave it to DD and it is still working! My Kenwood Chef did eventually expire but I got 30 years out of it.

Between Magimix and KitchenAid I had a Cuisinart. Lid broke, no spares available. Waste of money. You can still buy spares for the Magimix!

Well... I'm ancient and I have no problem with any Le Creuset. I wouldn't, however, use a LeC saucepan and strain anything from it. I could, but I don't, because I don't have LeC saucepans. But casseroles, griddles, I use all the time.

I have three of the casseroles in varying sizes. I love them and have had them all between 20 and 30 years. I love the fact that I can start them on the job and then put them in the oven. I'm not sure I would bother with the cast saucepans but I have their frying pans and also a shallow lidded pan of theirs.

I'm a definite fan, yes they're worth the money and their goods have a lifetime guarantee.

I’ve got the large griddle pan thing…never use it as it’s too heavy to lift down from the shelf!