I have a cast iron skillet that I couldn’t possibly replace since I don’t even know where to buy these anymore, but they’re also surely too expensive. Anyway, mine went through the dishwasher and is all rusty now. Is there any way to save it?
–Anonymous
Momma says:
Well, I could tell you where to buy cast iron, but you are definitely right about it being expensive. (Hardware or Coop Feed stores usually sell cast iron) Two of mine came from Grandma through inheritance and the third and largest one came from Goodwill for a measly $3. But that was a gift from hubby.
And you don’t find those in stock every day.
Now back to your actual question. Dishwashers are a NO-NO for cast iron. Mine went through the dishwasher when a 14 year old son was doing me a favor many years ago. So how do you save it? (We will concentrate only on the inside of the skillet.) Do you have any Idaho potatoes. Real ones, not instant! You also have to have Comet or Ajax Cleanser. Take the potato and cut the end off of it. Wet your skillet. Sprinkle a little of the cleanser in the pan. Use the potato as a scouring pad. Rub the cleanser around until it is gooey and not doing much. Rinse and repeat. You will need to cut a sliver of potato off to have a new face on the “scrubber”. You keep rinsing and reapplying the cleanser and cutting slices off the potato until all the rust has been removed. It should not re-rust if you have gotten it good and clean. Something about the potato juice chemical combining with the cleanser chemicals just kills that rust.
However, you are not through yet! You need to re-season the pan so it will not stick. Put 1/4″ to 1/2″ of oil, lard or shortening in the pan. Put it in the oven at about 200 degrees. Bake for at least 2 hours. Hopefully you wait until winter to season it. I picked this tip up when I lived in Central Florida on the coast in the late 1960’s. Everything rusted. I have always wondered who was the first person to figure a potato would be a good scrub pad. Send me a picture once you finish. I know what it looks like now, honey.