Posted on 01/26/2007 3:42:45 PM PST by blam
Heating releases cookware chemicals
Janet Raloff
Nonstick coatings on fry pans and microwave-popcorn bags can, when heated, release traces of potentially toxic perfluorinated chemicals into the air and the food being cooked, a new study suggests. Although the chemicals aren't subject to any regulatory restriction and have uncertain toxicity, the researchers conducting the study suggest that people at least run kitchen-exhaust fans when using these products. A 2005 industry study found no such releases.
Chemist Kurunthachalam Kannan and his New York State government team, based in Albany, performed the tests on four brands of nonstick fry pans and two brands of microwave popcorn. Their findings appear online and in an upcoming Environmental Science & Technology.
The scientists heated new fry pans of various brands on a 250°C hot plate for 20 minutes. About half the samples released high amounts of gaseous fluorotelomer alcohols (SN: 10/11/03, p. 238: Available to subscribers at http://www.sciencenews.org/articles/20031011/note17.asp) and perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA). The team heated two pans three more times to see if the chemical releases would fall as pans age. That occurred with one pan but not with the other.
The team also detected PFOA in water boiled for 10 minutes in two of the five pans tested.
When the researchers popped corn in the microwave bags, gaseous emissions contained low amounts of PFOA and high amounts of fluorotelomer alcohols. The oily coatings left inside the bags contained the chemicals as well, the team reports. The group didn't reveal the brands of nonstick pans or popcorn bags that it tested.
Cookware manufacturers have pledged to phase out PFOA, used to make some nonstick coatings, by 2015. The chemical is a suspected carcinogen, nervous system poison, and estrogen mimic found in the blood of people worldwide (SN: 3/25/06, p. 190: Available to subscribers at http://www.sciencenews.org/articles/20060325/note17.asp; 12/2/06, p. 366: Available to subscribers at http://www.sciencenews.org/articles/20061202/note16.asp).
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Teflon does decompose into some nasty chemical is those non stick pans reach a temperature of well over 500 F.
Trace amounts over many years are meaningful.
Thanks!
I don't have Corning for the stove top, but I love it in the oven. One of my favorite meals is roast chicken. When it's done, I put the chicken on a plate and prepare the gravy, in the Corningware, on the stovetop burner.
Years ago, while visiting someone, I decided to make a roast chicken for dinner. Since this person didn't have a roasting pan, I bought a glass "lasagne size" roasting dish....(Anchor-Hocking?) I didn't read the warning on the pan that says, "Use in oven only. Do not use on stove-top."
While making the gravy on the stove-top, this 9x12 dish shattered and flew all over the kitchen, even hitting the ceiling....pretty dangerous. Much clean-up! Needless to say, I learned something that day!
I support your freedom to ingest water too.
My mother tossed out the aluminum cookware about 1948 or 49 and replaced it with S/S after she read about it in Rodale's Prevention Magazine. We use S/S with a copper biscuit sandwiched in the bottom. Cast iron is too heavy for my wife.
I would worry more about exotic birds in the kitchen...
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
However, modern hard-anodized aluminium is a different story. I use the Calphalon professional. Good stuff. The only problem is that you can't put it in the dishwasher.
When I was in college 31 years ago I bought a set of Amway Queen stainless steel cookware($750). One of the best purchases I ever made. It has been in near continuous use. It looks like it is maybe five years old. This I can put in the dishwasher. The only problem is that I have to replace the bakelite handles about every 6 years.
'La bonne cuisine est la base du véritable bonheur.' - Auguste Escoffier
(Good food is the foundation of genuine happiness.)
LonePalm, le Républicain du verre cassé (The Broken Glass Republican)
I swear by my ScanPans I received for my wedding 20+ years ago. I just love them. They're titanium-fired ceramic, which I don't think off-gasses like Teflon does.
I should have mentioned the OLD-STYLE aluminum pans - the thin ones - were just awful. My mom had a couple of those and I just hated cooking in them.
Tell your wife she should be doing weight-bearing exercises to help prevent osteoporosis!!! Lifting those iron skillets is GOOD for her!!! ;-)
How much did they spend on this study? I remember hearing this about 20 years ago.
Crap! PTFE is polytetrafluoroethylene and is called Teflon....it only starts to degrade at 700 F and that is the non heat stabilized form.....and when it degrades under heat,
it outgasses a harmless gas that you would have to breathe for 10,000 years at 500,000 ppm to do you harm....
1) The temperatures at which noxious gasses are released by teflon coated pans, coincidently, are the temperatures at which the coating is ruined for further use. If you are not retarded, you will notice when this event occurs.
2) For most non-stick applications, a well seasoned cast iron frying pan is just as good if not better than a teflon coated aluminum pan. Unfortunately, to reach that level of seasoning takes up to 1 minute more each time the pan is used than throwing a $15 dollar teflon pan into the dishwasher and replacing the teflon pan every 2-3 years.
3) For cooking french omelettes, crepes, and other egg based dishes where light and fluffy is nice without a lot of butter or oil added, teflon is the cat's meow. The temperatures used to cook these dishes comes nowhere near the off-gassing (destruction) point of teflon.
4) People no longer learn how to cook healty and use kitchen tools properly. My deceased parents were outstanding cooks, and I kick myself often for not learning more from them while they were alive. We were very poor growing up but we ate like kings! I constantly amaze my (other side of the tracks) wife and in-laws by looking at what's in the fridge and coming up with healthy and delicious meals out of leftovers. Thank God for the Food Network, hopefully there will be a renaissance in the USA for cooking and eating healthy and delicious instead of what can be popped into the microwave for 5 minutes.
6) Teflon pans are tools that must be used properly, same for seasoned cast iron, stainless clad aluminum (all-clad), copper, enameled cast iron (le crueset), and any other pot or pan. Use any of them wrong and your meal is inedible. I use all of the above products depending on the dish and ingredient. I eat very well and friends and family always ask me to cook during get-togethers.
That's a lot hotter than they are normally used.
..And above all published Max operating temperatures for Teflon™ and related fluorotelomers.
We endured these stories for the last several years. It is another trial lawyer grab-bag.
They all dream of more tobacco and asbestos settlements.
Let's follw the money and find out who really paid for "studies" designed to deliberately pyrolize or unzip fluoropolymers.
WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE (some day from something)!!!
When I bought an African Gray bird the breeder told us to never scortch a teflon pan or the bird will die.
I am afraid it is of the utmost indifference to me what you support. Have another glass of water.
God bless you...and you are right.
Ever try finding a Chemistry Set for your grand kids?
That was one of the joys of my youth...even ran the family out of the house with burning sulphur. And they lived to 90 plus.
So much of this is hyper-nanny fear mongering.
I'll bet none of these researchers ever fell out of a cherry tree after an afternoon of sucking on tree sap and gorging on black cherries.
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