Cookaholics Bulletin Board

Folks,

So our new house has an electric stove with a glass/ceramic cooktop. Which is white. And whenever we cook anything in cast iron on top of it, we end up with a ring of burned-on oil dots which require Barman's Friend and scrubbing to remove.

Is there some way to avoid this? Are glass cooktops and cast iron incompatible?

Something I suggested to a friend, which worked well to prevent the scratching on an induction cooktop, was to sand the cast iron smooth. We first used my random orbit sander with aluminum oxide disks, but later switched to silicon carbide, moving up to 1200 grit, whitch gave it a super smooth finish. He still doesn't use it as much as he used to, I think because the weight worries him, but the smooth finish has prevented scratching, for the mosf part.

Dave,

There's no scratching. I'd be surprised if there was; high-temp ceramic is much harder than iron. But there's some seriously unsightly discoloration.

In general, the best product for cleaning a glass top stove, by far, is Carbona Ceramic cooktop power cleaner. It outdoes everything else I've tried. I've bought it at Ace hardware. When I ordered it from Amazon - it was dry as a rock and hard to use.

In second place, but quite good, is MAAS metal polish. It was so popular with frustrated glass top owners (online) that they now have their own glass top polish. I still use the metal polish along with Weiman cooktop scrubbing pads. One or two applications usually does the trick.

I'd be interested in your thoughts of cast iron on a glass top stove. Because of something I read online, I never used cast iron until very recently. So far, so good but for searing only.

Gerard.

Our house in Portland had a glass top (Kitchenaid) range. I loved it because it was so easy to clean.
Never had marks from any type of cookware.
I wonder if the answer is to severely clean the sole of your cast iron pan(s) with some of the aforementioned cleaners. Maybe even an oven cleaner would remove the residue off the bottom of the pan.

Linda,

Wait, where did you live in Portland?

Southeast. On Mount Scott. For more than 20 years.

Linda,

Ah, I'm up in Roseway. What took you to Montana?

Fuzzy,
Moved here for retirement. Love the climate.
I had lived here in the 60‘s so I knew the area well. I'd also had my fill of rain and dark skies after my many years in W. Oregon.