I am going to launch DP into the SUN for this.

[Yesitsbess]

Ten years. TEN YEARS of careful seasoning of my cast iron pan and he has "cleaned it". With wire wool.

After I pay Elon Musk to devise a trebuchet large enough to launch him directly into the Sun, does anyone have any advice as to whether this is even vaguely salvageable?

Yes That is indeed serious - I feel for you!
I have issued every adult member of my hosehold with pans of their own.
They can do what they like with their 'non-stick' stuff, but nobody touches MY pan.

@Wroxie would you show us a pic of your 150 year old pans?

@SuperCaliFragalistic

I don't really understand seasoning a pan. Can someone explain?

Heat reacts with oil and turns into a hard, non-stick polymer on iron and steel. If done correctly and in thin layers you have a naturally non-stick cooking surface that will last a lifetime (and longer) with proper maintenance. If you do it badly, or if you leave your husband alone with it, you end up with something as in OPs picture which will stick to everything and leave black flakes in your food- but you can always use some combination of super-high heat, strong chemicals, and elbow grease to take it back to bare metal and start again.

the rivets suggest it's not cast iron. still it would be hard to excuse him for this kitchen faux pas.

@Prokupatuscrakedatus

Yes That is indeed serious - I feel for you! I have issued every adult member of my hosehold with pans of their own. They can do what they like with their 'non-stick' stuff, but nobody touches MY pan.

I am going to have to keep my pans in the wardrobe aren't it?

Wow, what's going on here! I feel like when you've missed a class and everyone learned a new equation!

So do u just not wash cast iron pans? I'm trying to Google it but I don't really know what to be googling. Obviously it's the wrong answer but on my first look I figured the silver bit was the good bit!

@Flossieskeeper

LTB

Don't tempt me

That does not look like cast iron?!

Oh gawd. DH looks after the cast iron in this house because I can't be bothered. If I ruined his pan and wok he'd bean me with it. We were on holiday in Pas de Calais a few years ago and Dh's highlight, which he still bangs on about, was a visit to the Le Creuset foundry.

@fallfallfall

the rivets suggest it's not cast iron. still it would be hard to excuse him for this kitchen faux pas.

Wroxie looked it up and you can have a cast iron pan with rivets apparently.

Completely agree with the second part of your post and am ordering a hit man as we speak...

Yeah I missed the cast iron pan lesson too.

DH & I are in agreement (a rare event). No excuse for this. DH suggests you get today's pan in one hand, the wok in the other, & flatten your DP for a better trajectory towards the sun. Frisbee style.

You have to set about re-seasoning. No soap may touch its hallowed surface. Nor tomatoes. Do some deep frying*.

*It doesn't be your man but that's an option.

It looks a bit like a crescent moon now, doesn't it?

If I remember I'll show my pans tomorrow! I'm far too cosy to go downstairs now though.

Full disclosure - the pans in question spent a good portion of their 150 years unloved and unused in an outbuilding - but my great-grandma remembered them being used by her own mother and grandmother as late as the 1940s when my mother dug them out and restored them in the 1980s. Both the manufacturing marks and my great-grandma's recollections date them to the 1860s, when great-grandma's own grandma was married and moved to the house and farm that are still in our family (sorry that's all very convoluted LOL- and I'm not rich or anything, I'm just American, land and history is cheap there).

He should order you a new one and then use that one to dig his grave.

@LegoCaltrops

DH & I are in agreement (a rare event). No excuse for this. DH suggests you get today's pan in one hand, the wok in the other, & flatten your DP for a better trajectory towards the sun. Frisbee style.

So many wonderful posters on this thread but that one made me honk laugh.

@DriftingBlue

He should order you a new one and then use that one to dig his grave.

AND THIS!

@PullTheWeeds

Wow, what's going on here! I feel like when you've missed a class and everyone learned a new equation!

So do u just not wash cast iron pans? I'm trying to Google it but I don't really know what to be googling. Obviously it's the wrong answer but on my first look I figured the silver bit was the good bit!

Once they have a good seasoning going you can wash them. I rinse with hot water and a dish brush which is usually enough, though I will use a little fairy liquid if I cooked fish in them.

The seasoning is like money in the bank. Cooking with oil deposits seasoning. Cooking with acid or using soap withdraws seasoning. As long as your deposits are higher than your withdrawals you're all good. You learn to read the pan and know if it needs a little extra oil rubbing in now and then or if you need to take a break from anything tomatoe-y for a while.

That's a manky enamel pan surely??

Lord help us.

Leave the bastard and sue for full custody of the pans, I wouldn't even allow supervised weekend access.

Link to wok seasoning thewoksoflife.com/how-to-season-a-wok/

@BlackeyedSusan a cast iron pan is essentially made "non stick" by seasoning (have a YouTube session on it, very therapeutic) and they can go for generations with everyone building up layers. No acidic foods (tomatoes!) and for some people no soap. But the crux of the issue is: if you clean it with wire wool I get to launch you into the Sun.

At what point did he realise he'd fucked up? Or did you interrupt his folly of the wire wool and scream?

Fry his liver on it and enjoy with fava beans and a nice chianti.